


A Purposeful Grimace and a Terrible Sound

by Just_Bonesy



Category: Godzilla - All Media Types, The Legend of Zelda & Related Fandoms, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild
Genre: Author is Open to Constructive Criticism, Bittersweet Ending, BotW NPC Deaths, Cover Art, Distressing imagery, Emotional Trauma, Gen, Linked Universe (Legend of Zelda), Mass Loss of Life, Natural Disaster Imagery
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-02
Updated: 2021-03-06
Packaged: 2021-03-10 16:29:16
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 10
Words: 50,512
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28470186
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Just_Bonesy/pseuds/Just_Bonesy
Summary: The nine Heroes of Courage are brought by an unusual portal to Wild’s time, where they learn that a giant monster unlike any seen in Hyrule’s history has emerged from the depths. Now it’s up to them to find a way to stop it—if they can.A Linked Universe x Godzilla crossover fic. Broad content warnings are listed in the story tags, specific warnings are listed at the beginning of each chapter. Cover artwork created by Fidget the Crazy.Linked Universe is a Legend of Zelda fan comic created by Tumblr artist jojo56830.
Comments: 69
Kudos: 55





	1. Landfall

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content warnings: Description of a natural disaster and the associated emotional turmoil, destruction, and loss of life.

_ Destiny blankets the land of Hyrule in a shroud that has rested upon the kingdom since its birth, a cycle of struggle between the forces of Light and Dark that has been in motion for eons, and eons, and eons. There is always a form of Malice, ruthless and hungry for power. There is always a princess, blessed and wise beyond her limited years. And there is always a hero, virtuous and courageous despite his many, many hardships. And when the time has come, they have always risen, stepped forward, and played their part. But for all of its wide reach over Hyrule, Destiny is not omnipotent. _

_ Equal in strength with Destiny is the force of Free Will.  _

_ Though destined to face the Malice, the heroes choose to extend their hands to help others outside of this cycle. Though destined to face the Malice, the princesses choose to battle against greed and power in their own governments, to protect their people from the shadow of inequity. Though destined to face the Malice, the heroes are not guaranteed to prevail…or to survive. _

_ Destiny and Free Will strike a balance in the order of the world to maintain stability. But, like the Golden Triangles that were left behind in the making of the world, there is a third weight in that balance. In the space where predestination and agency meet is the realm of coincidence, of unknowable consequence. It is the realm of unforeseen and indifferent misfortune—of illness, nature’s wrath, and the ripples cast by the acts of kings, and gods, and lowly thieves alike. _

_ Equal in strength with Destiny and Free Will is the force of Chaos. _

_ And it is Chaos that brings a gateway to the land of Hyrule, of all the places it could’ve opened.  _

_ And it is this gateway—opened by beings worlds away who know not what misfortune they have unleashed—that brings a new being into this land. It is a great and powerful beast that finds itself deep beneath an ocean it does not know. But it feels  _ something _ familiar. Something that this beast  _ cannot _ abide. _

* * *

The sky was still dark over the waves washing ashore in Lurelin Village. In less than an hour, the sun would peek over the horizon and illuminate its beautiful sands and clear waters. Mubs, the tall, slender woman who owned the village’s general store on the pier, had until that light made its grand appearance to finish setting up the stands bearing her wares. She took a moment to examine what she’d accomplished so far: of the six large trays on display, half were filled. With the non-edible items like arrows, shock arrows, and octo-balloons arranged in a manner that satisfied her needs for presentation, she could now worry about the foodstuffs. 

She stepped onto her boat and made her way over to the baskets containing her freshest catches. An open carrying tray sat on its side beside the basket to her left. Taking it in hand, she pressed it into her hip and lifted the basket’s lid to expose its contents: freshly caught armored porgies. As she placed one into the carrying tray, she couldn’t help but grimace at the thought of the fish’s texture. As far as she was concerned, fish should be soft. It should fall apart in her mouth. Armored porgy was not soft and it did not fall apart in her mouth. It was tough and  _ crunchy _ .

Fish should  _ not _ be crunchy.

When Mubs finished loading the tray with three of the offensive crunch-fish, she replaced the basket lid and carefully stepped back onto the pier. She placed the porgies on their display tray—in as visually pleasing an arrangement as dead fish could be in—and made her way back towards her boat. She had just stepped onboard when the deck suddenly moved beneath her feet.

With a yelp, she dropped the carrying tray and flung herself forward to latch onto one of her baskets. She felt the boat spin and tilt below her before she and her supplies were sent sliding down the deck. They spilled over the edge, and then Mubs was falling with her heart in her throat. She dropped for only a second before she landed in the water, her fall cushioned by one of her baskets.

For a terrifying moment, she had no way of knowing which way was up or down. She thrashed about until her arm hit a rock of some kind, sending shocks of pain to her fingertips and her neck. When her body landed on the seabed, she found her footing and pushed herself upwards—and broke through the water’s surface  _ much _ sooner than she expected. Thrown off balance, she fell again before finding her footing again and standing upright. She burst through the surface and expelled seawater from her throat, coughing and sputtering. When she could breathe again, she looked around to make sense of what had happened, and what she saw made her blood freeze.

She was standing on the floor of the natural harbor that Lurelin Village curved around. The water level had receded so drastically that it now only came up to her hips. The pier she had been standing on moments earlier now loomed over her, her boat hanging by the stern from the short, thick line of heavy rope that tied it to the dock. The bow was low enough for her to reach in and touch the deck.

Such a sudden and severe evacuation of water from the bay could only mean one thing.

Mubs turned and waded as fast as she could toward Armes's house. The sound of snapping rope made her look back in time to see her boat fall into the shallows below, landing nose-first in a spray of bay water. She turned away and resumed her course before it finished keeling over onto its side with another mighty splash. Her feet carried her to Armes's doorway, where she stopped short of colliding into him. He was barely able to eke out a syllable before Mubs cut him off.

_ "Tidal wave! _ There's a wave coming, ring your bell,  _ hurry!!" _ She didn't even wait for a response before she turned and ran down the village's main path, yelling as she went.  _ "TIDAL WAVE!!! There's a wave coming, WAVE!!!" _

Some villagers had cautiously made their way outside after Mubs’s boat fell to its grave. When she started screaming and Armes ran from his home hammering a large bell, they sprung into a frenzy of action. Some ran inside to grab family members or precious valuables. Others immediately took off toward the road out of town. A few ran to neighbors and friends' homes to help where they could.

Mubs fled through the village at the head of a growing pack. Her feet raced against her heart, as if each feared being left behind by the other. Her ears roared with the staccato throbbing of her pulse, the clamorous din of the villagers’ yelling, the rumble of their stampede, and the sharp clanging of the warning bell. Some part of her mind wanted to look back, to look for the wave, to see how much time they had left to escape, but she knew better than to do so. She kept her eyes forward and focused on the path before her, pushing herself along the main road as it began to incline towards higher ground.

Yet even despite her focus, Mubs’s fear betrayed her. She pushed herself with such desperation that she stumbled and fell onto her face. Feet hammered her and bodies fell on her as the front of the stampede collapsed. The rest of the herd split in twain, flowing around the pile of fallen like water around a rock. Mubs hurried to untangle herself from the knot of limbs she found herself in until someone hauled her to her feet, a hand on her elbow pulling her along. She had barely registered that it was Numar, the son of the village’s elder, who had helped her when the sound finally reached her ears.

The distant sound of roaring water growing louder, and louder, and louder.

A swell of ice grew from the pit of Mubs’s stomach, climbing through her chest and into her throat. She neither felt nor heard herself begin to whine as she pushed, pushed,  _ pushed _ herself up the inclining road. Ahead, she saw the pathway that would lead to safety: the empty plain that overlooked the village, where a monster camp had once stood before the Calamity had been destroyed. She saw the pathway ahead, but she could hear the wall of destruction behind her growing louder. She could  _ feel _ the wall of destruction growing closer in the rumbling of the earth. The sounds of wooden structures being violently smashed and demolished reached her ears, and Mubs  _ tried _ , she  _ tried so hard _ to fly, to fly up the road as if her feet were fit with the wings of a pegasus.

The roar of the wall was no longer distant, it was behind them, it was rushing up the canyon behind them and bearing towards them all. The pathway out of the canyon grew closer before Mubs, and the wall grew louder and larger and closer behind her, and the path grew closer, and the wall grew louder,  _ and the path grew closer and the wall grew louder and she was so close she was so so close— _

The next thing she knew, Mubs was running up the pathway, then she was in the plain and she was  _ safe _ , she was on high ground and she was  _ safe. _ But she didn’t stop. She kept running, her legs carrying her on as if she planned to run northeast to Keya Pond, or the Dunsel Plateau, and beyond. She heard the roar of the water in the canyon behind her blasting by, rushing towards the Atun Valley. It was only when she passed the abandoned, wooden tower by several yards that she finally stopped, collapsed to her knees, and tried to catch her breath. She felt tears in her eyes, and she let out an animalistic moan as she tried to expel the ice, the pressure, the  _ fear _ from her chest. She heard the crashing of waves and the sounds of voices, and crying, and moaning.

Then Mubs felt the earth shake.

It was a single, sudden tremor; a brief beat. She felt it again and it was just a little stronger. It was when she felt the third tremor, stronger than the second, that she heard the screams behind her rise up in alarm. She whipped her head around and saw a gathering of villagers looking south, towards the sea that used to be their home. This group was backing away from whatever it saw. It was when she felt the fourth tremor, stronger still, that Mubs looked out to the water herself—and her entire body froze at the sight.

It was as if a mountain had risen from the ocean, a gargantuan spire that could only be seen in silhouette against the faintest, palest hint of dawn. The fifth tremor, even stronger, coincided with the more dreadful realization that this mountain was no mountain. It had the shape of a torso, stout and burly; of arms, curled at its sides with clawed hands; of a neck and a head that towered far above any living being or physical structure Mubs had ever seen in her entire life. Most terrifying of all, it  _ moved _ , it  _ swayed _ as it walked, as it  _ approached closer and closer _ toward the submerged remains of the village.

It was when she felt the sixth tremor, the strongest yet, that Mubs realized that the tremors were  _ footsteps. _

She heard the other villagers screaming and running. She wanted to scream and run as well. She knew she  _ needed _ to run, because the thing in the water was not just marching towards land, its immense legs pushing the sea itself in billowing breakers. It was marching directly toward the plain that the villagers had fled to for safety, the plain that was now a stretch of shoreline.

But try as she might, Mubs could not move from where she kneeled, her insides constricted in a frosted grip. She could not stand, she could not move. She could not tear her eyes away from the being, the titan, the  _ god _ that walked upon the world. She craned her neck up, and up, and up as it came closer and closer. It was when one of the titan’s gigantic feet emerged from the sea, moved over the plain, and began to plummet towards her that Mubs finally regained control of herself.

She screamed, threw her arms over her head, and flung herself to the ground.

She simultaneously  _ felt _ and  _ heard _ thunder detonate within the earth. She felt the concussive shock in her bones and her innards, and she heard the cracking fireworks of shattering wood. She heard the torrents of waves cascading from the sky, and then a second blast of thunder struck the earth again. She felt and heard another explosion in the earth. She felt the air displace around her. Then another explosion, then another, then another, each fainter than the last. An eternity seemed to pass before Mubs realized that, not only could she hear and feel the tremors fade into the distance, but she was  _ still alive. _

Mubs opened her eyes, her breath stuck somewhere in her throat, and lifted her head. She slowly pushed herself off of the ground with trembling arms until she was standing upright, her legs feeling as if they could give out at any moment. What she saw before her, where the monster tower once stood, was an impression in the earth, a mark left by the stride of the great beast. Her breath hitched in her throat four times when she finally recognized that the beast had missed crushing her by a mere three feet.

As the sun peeked further over the horizon—and the earth shook with the reverberations of distant steps—Mubs could only stare at the pit that was almost her grave and try to regain control of her breathing. She stared, and tried to breathe, and stared, and tried to breathe. Then, with a final, terrifying  _ squeeze _ , she collapsed to her knees as all of her fear spilled out from her chest in sobs and wails.


	2. First Readings

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content Warnings: Canon-typical violence.

_Link stands on a large, smooth outcropping of coral at the edge of a cliff. Behind him is the faint droning of the Veiled Falls. Before him is the massive superstructure of Zora’s Domain, carved from a form of coral that is entirely unique to this region of Hyrule. It is illuminated by luminous stones that glow like turquoise stars, as the sun has set low enough to cast the Domain in the surrounding cliffs' shadows. Beside him is his dearest friend._

_“I’ve lived here my entire life,” Mipha says, “and I always find my breath stolen from me by this sight.”_

_He has not lived here his entire life, but he understands exactly what she means. Its size, scale, and craftsmanship make Zora’s Domain a marvel of artistry and engineering. It is nothing short of awe-inspiring in its own right. But when the stones glow and bathe its pillars and pathways in their light, it seems like it can only be a work of magic._

_He does not say any of this. He doesn’t say much of anything, and he hasn’t for quite some time._

_The weight of the sword on his back is too heavy._

_Mipha seems to understand, somehow, and that is one of many reasons why she is so dear to him._

_“I am glad you are here to share this with me tonight,” she says. He is still looking at the Domain, but he can hear, in the subtle change of clarity and volume in her voice, that she’s now looking directly at him. “I know it’s not the first time we’ve seen this together, but it always brightens my day, as surely as those stones brighten the coral.”_

_Now he turns his head to look at her, and he finds her smiling towards him. He returns a smile of his own. He feels pressure on his left arm, where it is now pressed against her right. He feels the back of her hand graze his._

Then Wild blinked, and his past was gone.

He stood on a large, smooth outcropping of stone at the edge of a pond. Behind him was the distant droning of a small waterfall. Before him was the flat, calm water, perfectly reflecting the lights of dozens of drifting fireflies. It was nearly dark, with only the deep orange on the edge of the horizon illuminating the sky.

He wasn’t in Zora’s Domain. He wasn’t even in his own time. The nine Heroes of Courage were in Twilight’s era, in a field south of Kakariko Village. They were too far from the village to make it there before sundown, so they’d set up camp. Wild had set out to find some particular ingredients for dinner, but it seemed he’d found something else instead.

He heard a noise behind him and turned around to find Legend standing nearby, looking off into the distance. At the sound of Wild’s movement, the veteran adventurer turned his eyes back to meet the Hylian Champion’s. 

“Hey,” Legend said, his face bearing his usual neutral expression. “You okay?”

Wild nodded. “Yeah. I just had a, uh…I just remembered something. From my old life.” He looked up to the sky and took stock of the intense, orange glow emanating from the distance. “I’ve been gone awhile, huh?”

“Yeah. The rancher would’ve probably taken off to look for you a long time ago, but he dozed off right after you left camp, so the old man told someone else to go.”

“I would’ve thought the traveler would volunteer first.”

“He did, but the old man nixed that idea. Said ‘we’re already looking for one wandering soul, I’d rather not make it two.’”

Wild snorted at that. “How long have you been standing there?”

“Couple minutes, maybe,” Legend said with a shrug before he started walking up onto the rock. Now standing beside Wild, he took in the sight of the pond and the fireflies. The veteran’s features softened, just a little, before he said, “S’quite a view.”

“Yeah,” Wild agreed, turning back to the sight himself.

They stood there for a moment and basked in the music of nature. They listened to the chirping crickets, croaking frogs, droning insect wings, and the distant hum of the small waterfall somewhere behind them. It was Legend who finally broke the silence between them. 

“So, uh….” He sniffed quickly. “What’d you, uh, what’d you remember?”

Wild set his jaw. “Enjoying a view with…with Mipha.”

Legend nodded with a hum. After another long silence, he asked, “Do you…have anything else of hers? Besides her journal? Something else that…helps you remember her?”

Wild shrugged. “I’ve got her trident and a picture of her hanging on my walls back home. I’ve got a cuirass of armor she made for me, and I’ve seen her statue. That’s it.”

Legend only offered another, more muted, hum. Wild didn’t blame him. He certainly couldn’t think of anything to say, were the roles reversed. There aren’t many words to offer to a man who had lost someone so dear, someone who now only existed in so few, fleeting scraps and fragments that she might as well have been a woman from a dream.

The veteran finally cleared his throat and said, “D’you, uh, get those fish you needed?”

Wild blinked. “Hm? Oh! Uh, I don’t think so.” He looked into his magic adventuring pouch and dug around his food stores until he finally had his answer: “No.”

He lifted his Sheikah Slate and materialized two remote bombs made of the glowing, blue energy of Sheikah technology—one round and the other cubed—and casually tossed them both into the pond. 

Legend’s eyes widened in panic as he turned to run. “No wait let me—”

_BWWOOSSSHHHH_

A column of water blasted into the air before gravity brought it back down, dousing Wild and Legend both. The latter froze in place, drenched from head to toe. The former simply hopped into the pond and began wading around, collecting dead fish in his bottomless pouch. Legend finally straightened his posture and pushed his waterlogged hair out of his eyes, turning back to the pond in time to see Wild climb out and walk towards him.

Legend glowered through his dripping bangs at the approaching cook. “Why are you like this?”

To that, Wild could only shrug.

* * *

The next morning, after a delicious breakfast, the band of heroes broke camp and resumed their trek. They eventually made it to Kakariko, where they learned that unfamiliar monsters had been causing trouble for travelers on the roads north of town. With an objective in hand, the heroes trudged their way through the vast plain where Twilight had faced Ganondorf in their final showdown. After an hour or so of walking north on a long, straight road, Twilight held up one hand from his and Epona’s position at the head of the group, bringing the party to a halt. He withdrew his Hawkeye mask from his adventuring pouch and placed it over his eye. The mechanisms inside the mask quietly whirred.

“Found ‘em,” he said.

Time stepped up beside the rancher. “What are we dealing with?”

“It looks like…three moblins from the sailor’s time, all armed with spears, and…two of your lizalfos with swords.”

“Any archers?”

“Doesn’t seem like it.”

"Well, we certainly have the numbers advantage. But if they're infected, it'll be a more even fight."

“Lend me your telescope for a moment, Sailor,” Warriors said as he tapped Wind’s shoulder. The youngest hero retrieved the item in question from his pouch and handed it to the captain, who stepped up beside Time and placed it to his eye. “Hmm…long, straight road, a wide open field on both sides, no cover to speak of. They’d see us long before we could get the drop on them, even if we went off the road and tried to flank them.”

“Meet them head on, then?” Time asked.

“Not necessarily. The rancher could punch through their line with a cavalry charge, keep their focus on him while we push in from behind. If he’s a good enough distraction, we might finish them off before they even realize there’s a second prong to worry about.”

“You know who’d make me an even better distraction?” Twilight asked as he removed his Hawkeye mask. He looked back over his shoulder and said, “Hey Champion, how many bomb arrows do you have?”

“Not enough,” Wild replied.

“Not enough as in ‘I’m almost out’ or not enough as in ‘I want more?’” Twilight deadpanned.

“I want more.”

Warriors looked back with an arch in one of his eyebrows and asked, with a good-natured lilt in his voice, “Can we trust you not to blow _us_ up, too?”

“Everyone else, sure. You?” Wild wobbled his hand. “No promises.”

Warriors gave an amused huff and took one more look at the enemy. “All right, then, let’s move out.” He collapsed the telescope and handed it back to Wind before turning to Wild with both eyebrows raised a little too high. “And _please_ don’t forget to switch to regular arrows when you see we’re close.”

Wild replied with a smile and a salute, both exaggerated. “Yes _sir.”_

Twilight mounted his trusty steed and helped the champion up into the saddle behind him. With a flick of the reins, Epona flew down the road like a gale. Drawing their swords and shields, the other seven heroes followed after her.

* * *

Twilight and Wild bobbed and rocked as Epona raced north, rapidly approaching the monsters. Wild could now see that the five creatures were spread out across the road in a lazy, disjointed line. The rancher drew his sword.

“Blast the one on the left end to get their attention,” he yelled over the wind, “I’m gonna cut _right_ through the middle!”

“Got it,” Wild replied as he nocked a bomb arrow. He saw the lizalfos at the western-most end of the enemy line notice their approach, its yellow eyes wide as it gave a double take. He couldn't help but smirk as he pulled back the bowstring.

_thwock_

_BWOOM_

The lizalfos let out a shriek as it was sent hurtling up into the air. The other monsters snapped their attention to the blast before looking about for its cause. Cries of alarm sprouted among them like weeds when their eyes found the horse barreling towards them. Twilight reared his sword back and swung it across a moblin’s face as they rode past, a chorus of pained and angry yells fading behind them as quickly as it’d swelled on their approach. He lifted his sword to examine the streak of blood that ran up the edge of the blade— _black_ blood. 

“Infected,” the rancher reported. After putting the monsters meters and meters behind them, he brought Epona around in a wide, right turn to head east. The creatures tightened up into a more cohesive line, throwing out challenging roars and screeches as they waved their weapons about. Wild saw the lizalfos he’d blasted scramble to its feet—charred but still quite in fighting shape—and join its comrades. 

“Then we hit ‘em with a little something extra,” he said as he shifted his bow to fire to their right side. He pulled out his _something extra_ in the form of three bomb arrows, nocked them all at once, and drew the string back.

_thwock_

**_BWOOM_ **

The eruption sent the three monsters on the eastern end of the line flying up and crashing down in a ball of fire, smoke, and dirt. The seven heroes approaching on foot felt the concussive shock punch them in their chests but didn’t lose a step in their advance. “That crazy cook really _is_ gonna blow one of us up!” Legend growled.

Twilight pulled Epona into a wide U-turn south, bringing them to the fresh blast site and setting them up to ride west along the enemy line. He slashed one lizalfos that had barely escaped the blast across its chest as they rode by. The last monster standing—a moblin—planted its feet and raise its spear ahead of them, ready to try and skewer the approaching horse.

He foiled that plan by sheathing his sword, drawing his Gale Boomerang, and throwing a tornado at the unsuspecting monster. 

The moblin let out a wail as it was flung up into the air by the twister, landing precisely when the boomerang returned to Twilight’s grip. Wild nocked another bomb arrow, aimed back over his left side at the downed moblin, and waited until it’d regained its footing.

_thwock_

_BWOOM_

Now well past the western end of the monsters’ line, Twilight turned Epona north in another wide U-turn. Wild shifted to fire to the right again and took the opportunity to look back at the other heroes’ progress. Seeing that they were too close for explosives, he drew three standard arrows from his quiver. He nocked one, holding the other two in his drawing hand, and pulled the bowstring drawn back until Epona completed her turn and headed east again.

_thwock_

_thwock_

_thwock_

With a _sssthunk,_ the first arrow found home in the face of a moblin near the rear of the enemy’s formation. The impact sent it stumbling back, as if it’d been punched.

With a _sssthunk,_ the second embedded into the moblin’s cheek and forced it to drop its spear.

With a _sssthunk,_ the third slammed into the moblin’s nose and dropped it to a knee, its hands flying up to clutch its wounds.

The heroes approaching from behind moved in, with Warriors in the lead. He charged directly for the moblin with the pin cushion face and let out a mighty war cry as he leapt into the air. He plunged his sword straight down into the crook of the monster’s neck, eliciting a strangled, guttural cry of shock and pain. He withdrew his blade from the wound and leapt back, dodging a wild swipe of the moblin’s arm.

Another moblin turned around and received a horizontal slash across its chest from Time’s Biggoron Sword. It spun about and fell onto its face, then struggled to push itself back up to one knee. A second slash from the greatsword carved up its chest and sent it flailing onto its back, like it’d taken an uppercut. The third moblin stepped up to, spear raised for a thrust attack, but Sky swatted its strike down to the ground with the Master Sword and slammed his Goddess Shield into its face.

A lizalfos caught a slash on the side of one knee from the Phantom Sword. When it turned to face Wind, it caught a slash to its back from the Four Sword. When it turned to retaliate against Four, it caught a slash on its arm from the sailor. And when it turned to strike back against _him_ , it caught _another_ slash on its hip from the smith. The two heroes continued this dance around the scaled beast, whittling it down like one of Sky’s wood carvings.

Twilight guided Epona south towards the fray. Wild was looking for a shot to take that wouldn’t endanger one of his friends when a distant movement in the corner of his eye pulled his attention west. His blood ran cold at the sight of the corrupted contraption barreling towards them on serpentine legs.

_“Guardian!!”_

_“What?!”_ Twilight replied as he whipped his head around, his eyes widening when they found the approaching death machine. “Oh _hell_ , how many of those glowy blue arrows do you have left?”

“Not enough,” Wild replied without thought, his eyes fixed on the new threat while his mind sifted through ideas.

Twilight glared over his shoulder at the champion as he growled, “Not enough as in—”

“As in _one_ , I have _just one left!”_ Wild growled right back before the frustration on his face morphed into realization. “I can deal with it, but we need to lead it away from the others! Get us in bow range so I can get its attention!”

Twilight pulled off to the west, putting them on a head-to-head collision course with the charging guardian. As they grew closer, the two heroes saw that its eye was still focused on the fight happening behind them. 

“Pull over a bit so we pass it on the right!” Wild instructed as he nocked another bomb arrow. 

Twilight eased Epona over into a parallel path with the guardian, the distance between them closing with the speed of a hurricane wind. Wild drew the bowstring back and led his target. 

_thwock_

_BWOOM_

A blast of fire and smoke enshrouded the guardian for a brief second, but the machine’s speed carried it through before it came to a sudden stop. It swiveled its head about, scanning the environment for the source of the attack. Just when its blue eye settled on the approaching horse—

_BWOOM_

—it was rocked by another explosive projectile that enveloped the guardian in smoke again.

“Take us north!” Wild ordered. Twilight pulled Epona into another wide turn as the guardian burst from the black cloud, now speeding after _them_. Wild heard an unmistakable sound behind him.

_durdurdurdurdurdurdurdurdur_

He whipped his bow around and drew back another bomb arrow.

_thwock_

_BWOOM_

With the machine’s aiming system disrupted, he took the opening to pat Twilight on the shoulder. “I’m gonna dismount and get its attention, don’t stop! Peel off and head back to the others!”

“You’re gonna _what?!”_

“I can take care of this on my own, I’ve done it plenty of times!” Wild assured his friend.

The rancher was quiet for a moment before he finally replied, “All right! Be careful!”

Wild simply patted Twilight’s shoulder in response, then held it in a tight grip for balance. He shifted his feet under himself and rose into a squatting position on Epona’s back directly behind the rancher. When the guardian put its laser sight on them once again, Wild _launched_ himself into the air.

The world seemed to slow down around him as he nocked three bomb arrows and drew back his bow string.

_tttthhhhwwwwoooocccckkkk_

**_BBBBWWWWOOOOOOOOMMMM_ **

The machine recoiled and came to a halt before Wild even landed, his feet firmly planted on the ground.

His timing had to be perfect.

Wild stowed his bow away and drew his shield instead. The guardian bolted from the shroud of smoke, its movements sharper and quicker. He felt a buzzing in his extremities that normally came when he’d realized that he’d angered a dangerous animal. The guardian placed its laser sight directly on his sternum and raced towards him. The buzzing in his limbs intensified as the predator grew closer.

His timing had to be perfect.

He took a deep, slow breath and relaxed his body. He placed his focus firmly on the machine before him. The world went quiet around him, the distant sounds of fighting fading away until he could only hear one sound. 

_durdurdurdurdurdurdurdurdurdurdurdurdur_

The Guardian’s blue eye glowed brighter and brighter, and the seconds raced by closer and closer to the moment it would try to obliterate him.

_deedeedeedeedeedeedeedeedeedeedeedeedee_

His timing had to be _perfect._

Wild took one more breath—slowly in, slowly out. The buzzing sensation faded away. The glowing eye and the frantic beeping reached their crescendo. Then—

_ip_

_psheeEEWWW_

—a comet of destructive, blue energy _launched_ towards him. 

It streaked over the plain.

It burned through the air.

It outran the very sound of its own propulsion

And with a well-practiced, _perfectly_ -timed swing of his shield, Wild parried it right back into the guardian’s eye.

The machine rocked back from the impact and its legs gave out from under it, dropping the main chassis to the ground. Its head swiveled about as though disoriented. Wild swapped his shield for his bow and drew back his one ancient arrow. He pulled the trigger in the arrow’s head, activating the energy blade with a flash of blue light, and lined up the shot.

_thwock_

**psheeEEWW**

The arrow scored home in the guardian’s eye. Its head recoiled and whirled about again, faster than before. Light seemed to grow from within the machine before it exploded in a brilliant flash, leaving parts of ancient technology scattered about in its wake.

Wild let out another breath before turning back towards the skirmish in the distance; he barely caught the sight of Sky cutting down the last monster, which disappeared in a puff of smoke. Wild collected the nearby ancient parts before he made his way toward the party, arriving as the other heroes finished cleaning off their blades. 

“Good work, Champion,” Time said as he sheathed his greatsword.

Twilight walked up to his younger friend and lightly punched him in the shoulder. “Risky move there.”

Wild shrugged with an easy smile. “I have fairies.”

“How many?” Hyrule asked from nearby.

“Two,” Wild replied before his smile shrank into something notably less certain. “Or three. Uh, hold on….” He looked into his adventuring pouch and started shuffling items around.

Twilight’s frown grew deeper and deeper the longer his friend searched. “You _do_ actually have fairies, right?”

 _“Yes,_ I have fairies, I have… _two!_ I’ve got two.”

“How many more of those energy arrows do you have?” Four asked.

“That was my last one. I’ll have to restock the next time we’re in my—”

His words were cut off when the air itself _opened_ mere feet away from the group of heroes. The opening spread into a pointed arch shape that they were all quite familiar with by now. There were some major differences in this portal, however, that left all nine heroes quiet and uncertain of what they saw.

Rather than the swirling, heavy void of black, purple, and indigo they’d all traveled through, this portal was light in every sense of the world. It shone in a thin, rippling glow of white and gold that looked like the surface of a pond, rather than a vortex. Instead of subtly pulling the air into it, the portal gently breathed it out, like a doorway left open to let in a summer breeze.

The Heroes of Courage could only stare at it for a moment as their minds puzzled over these differences. It was Sky who moved first, his face alight with a gentle awe as he tenderly stepped up to stand before the portal and said, “That…is the light of _Hylia.”_

“That is….” Time started, his eye narrowed.

“Different,” Legend finished. “Breaks in patterns mean something important. Something big.”

“Do you think this is _it?”_ Wind asked, his brows furrowed. “Like, the _last one?_ Like the door to a boss chamber?”

The veteran quirked his eyebrows and hummed at the comparison. “Dunno. But there’s only one way to find out.”

They were all quiet for a moment before Time finally spoke up. “Who goes first, then?”

“I do,” Sky answered. Without a second’s hesitation, he strode forward and faded into the light.

The rest followed, in pairs and trios, with Twilight and Epona the last to enter. They’d only been gone for a second when the portal quietly closed behind them.

* * *

The nine heroes found themselves in a large, grassy path at the base of some rocky hills. The sky above them mostly bore the blue and pink mixture of early evening. As the group checked to ensure everyone was accounted for, Wild pulled up his Sheikah Slate to do what he always did after stepping out of one of these world-hopping portals: check to see if the map function worked. A grin split across his face when he found that it did.

“Anyone recognize this place?” Time asked after everyone confirmed they were present.

“Not exactly,” the champion answered without looking up from the slate, “but we’re in my Hyrule. Specifically, we are…east of Hanu Pond and north of Keya Pond.”

“Oh good,” Legend deadpanned. “And here I was afraid I still wasn’t gonna know where we are when you answered.”

“How far are we from your house?” Wind asked, his smile threatening to tear his cheeks.

“A couple days. But we’re a couple of _hours_ away from Lurelin Village,” Wild answered, pointing behind him with a thumb over his shoulder. “We might as well head there first, see if anyone’s seen or heard of anything that’d warrant the nine of us being here. Then I can warp us all to Hateno and we can stay the night there.”

“If they _have_ seen something, then we’ll have to stay the night in this village,” Time replied. 

“There’s a Sheikah Shrine overlooking Lurelin,” Wild replied with a wave of his hand. “I can just warp us all right back first thing in the morning.” He returned the slate to his belt and started walking backwards with his arms spread out and his hands open. “It goes without saying, but there is _nothing_ like finally coming ho— _oh!!”_

Wild vanished, falling backwards and disappearing from the other heroes’ sight. They immediately heard the sounds of his body hitting the ground and all of the wind being knocked out of his chest.

“Champion?” Twilight asked, with only a hint of worry in his voice, as he and the others walked to the spot where their comrade had just been. They found a huge depression in the earth, about three feet deep, with four large outcroppings that pointed north, towards the heroes. At the bottom of one such outcropping lay Wild, groaning.

“Maybe that’s why our feet and eyes are pointed _forward,_ Cook,” Warriors said with a chuckle.

“Ha ha,” Wild grumbled as he pulled himself up to his feet and looked up at his companions, most of whom seemed quite amused by what they’d seen. “Maybe I’ve just decided that you’re doing the dishes tonight.”

“Oh come on,” the captain replied. Whatever else he said was lost on Wild, whose attention was fully fixed on Twilight and Time. 

They were definitely _not_ amused, their eyes roving about the pit. The old man wore a stony expression, but Wild could only call the look on the rancher’s face _unsettled._ Wild turned around and took a good look at the pit himself, and understanding dawned on him as he noticed the details. He saw how flat the bottom was. How smooth the sides were. How immense it was in both length and width, perhaps dozens of meters in either direction.

He clambered out of the pit and pushed through the heroes before heading toward the hills to the west. 

“Champion?” Hyrule asked before following him, the others shortly behind. The champion hoofed his way up the hillside until he reached a sufficient elevation to turn around and see the whole depression from a heightened angle. What he saw confirmed Twilight's, Time’s, and his suspicions. Soon, the entire party was assembled on the hillside, and as the rest looked out, they went quiet.

“Whoa,” Wind whispered as he took in the sight of the pit below, the pit that wasn’t really a pit.

It was a footprint.


	3. Displacement

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content Warnings: Depiction of survivors who've suffered losses in a recent natural disaster.
> 
> That is to say: if you have survived a natural disaster but lost loved ones or your home to it, and would rather not be reminded of that time, this chapter might be rough for you. Or it might make you laugh at how melodramatic it is, I dunno. I know the chances of someone reading this needing such a warning are infinitesimal, but I'd rather have 99.9999% of you receive it and and not need it than 0.0001% of you need it and not receive it.

The heroes stood on that hillside in silence. One by one, they each pulled their gazes away from the footprint and looked to their left and right. They found exactly what they expected: more footprints. Two parallel trails led from south to north in an alternating pattern. The space between each step showed a stride so long that it could only belong to something massive. Time was the first one to speak. 

“Champion, is there anything in your time that would leave prints like these?”

“No,” Wild answered. “I mean, I never paid much attention to the dragons’ feet, but they fly. I don’t even know that they _can_ walk.”

“Whatever _this_ is,” Twilight said, reaching out and pointing from one print to the next in a left-right-left-right pattern, “it’s walking on two legs.”

“We might’ve just found the reason we’re here,” Four said. Time turned to Wild and pointed toward the prints’ origin. 

“That village you mentioned—it’s to the south, right?” he asked. Wild’s gaze turned to the same direction and an invisible band squeezed around his chest at the thought of Lurelin. 

“Yeah,” he answered.

“Then we need to get moving. They may need our help.”

Without another word, the group trekked back down the hill and began following the footprints in reverse. They traveled in silence between the trails of prints, each one passing them on either side. When they’d walked long enough for the sky above them to change to a mixture of light orange and gray, the trail turned southwest and brought them to Keya Pond.

The sight of it brought Wild to a stop.

What was once a serene, shallow pond, densely populated by lush trees, had become a site of desolation. Shattered, splintered timber jutted from the water like broken bones that punctured through flesh. Toppled treetops that had been flattened littered the pond’s surface with leaves. Even the trees that had avoided the worst of the damage stood lopsided, or were toppled entirely, their roots exposed like veins in a sword wound.

Wild remembered finding this pond during his journey to stop the Calamity. He remembered sitting to rest on a fallen tree trunk. He remembered the welcome shade of the canopy. He remembered the respite of just taking the weight off his feet and catching his breath while he listened to the insects.

And this was all that was left.

They began to walk through the pond, the shallow water sloshing around their legs. They carefully picked their way through the debris, pushing aside jagged pieces of crushed lumber that they could move and stepping around others that they couldn’t. Their progress was slow, and it seemed that they would pass through uneventfully.

Until Legend let out a yelp and fell face-first into the water with a resounding splash. Seconds later, he burst up from below, standing upright and forcefully coughing up pond water as he pushed his sopping hair out of his eyes. The others had to restrain their smiles when they noticed that he was now standing about three feet deeper in the water than he had been earlier.

Some were not as successful as others.

“I think you went a little too far to the side, Veteran,” Wind managed to squeeze out through his giggles. Others still didn’t even try to contain their mirth at all. Namely, Warriors, who openly laughed at his comrade’s misfortune. Legend simply glared at the lot of them as he reached over and snatched his cap up from the water. 

“I cannot wait to find and _stab_ this thing,” he muttered as he trudged over to find the nearest edge of the footprint.

Once through the pond, the heroes followed the trail further southwest. When the sky was a bright orange, the band around Wild’s chest tightened at the sight of the large hill they approached. They climbed partway up one slope and rounded the bend to descend down the other side. When the clearing that overlooked Lurelin Village came into Wild’s view, the band constricted to a vice grip.

The abandoned monster tower had been crushed, half of its wreckage flattened within the last of the massive footprints. The print’s heel pointed toward the cliff that loomed over the village. Two campfires had been built near the print, with barely a handful of people huddling near them. Wild led the group of heroes down to the clearing. As he walked toward the campfires, he recognized Kiana, with Kinov and Zuta in her lap, sitting at one.

Kiana’s head turned toward them, and Wild couldn’t find the words to describe the look that came over her face. She turned and said something to the two figures at the other campfire, Mubs and Chumin. Only the latter gave any reaction; Mubs remained still with her knees pulled up to her chest, her arms around them, and her head lowered. Kiana ushered the children off of her and said something to them before turning and walking out to meet Wild.

“Hello Link,” she said quietly. She no longer exuded the warmth and joy he had come to associate with her. She was subdued, her sun hidden by the clouds of whatever she had endured.

A hundred questions swirled in Wild’s mind, but he managed to find the one that encapsulated them all: “What happened, Kiana?”

She opened her mouth to answer, but no words came. She took a breath and tried again, but only found the same result. With another breath, her words finally broke through whatever barrier halted them.

“There was a loud sound. Woke us up. Sebasto and I got up to look when we heard Mubs yelling about a tidal wave. We grabbed the children and ran. We just ran. It was panic. We just barely made it up here. The water….” She turned back and pointed toward the cliff facing south. “The water came right up to the edge. We gathered to see if anything was left. But it was all gone. And then….” Kiana turned back to him, and Wild could not remember a time when he’d ever seen someone look so lost. 

“Something came out of the water,” she said. “It was a monster. But it was…it was the most…I didn’t think any living thing could _be_ that big. It was like a, a _god_. And it was coming right for us, so Sebasto and I ran again. We took the kids as far away as we could. Then, we saw that the monster was heading away,” she pointed in the direction the heroes had just come from, “so we came back. Others had run too, but they didn’t all come back. Now Sebasto and Numar are out looking for them.”

Wild looked back to the other campfire, where Mubs and Chumin sat. He thought of Chessica, the kindly manager of the fishing resort; of Rozel, the head of the village who was always eager to help when he could. A sharp point pressed into his heart when he considered why they weren’t there.

He managed to push those thoughts aside and ask, “Is anyone hurt?”

“I don’t think so. Mubs has been….” She spared a long look back at the merchant, who hadn’t moved an inch since the heroes had arrived, before turning back to the champion. “She had a really close call.”

“When did all of this happen?” Time asked.

Kiana looked to him for the first time and clearly only _just then_ registered how many new arrivals there were. After she recovered from that stumble, she said, “Uh, before sunrise. The sky was just starting to lighten.” 

Her gaze suddenly moved to something behind the heroes and she raised her arm in a wave. Wild and the others turned back to see two men approaching from the hills they’d just descended from. He recognized them both as Sebasto and Numar. The two men trudged down to them, and Sebasto’s eyes widened when he saw Wild. 

“Link, it’s been…what are…?” He seemed to deflate, his words trailing off and his shoulders slumping. Beside him, Numar took a long pull from his waterskin.

“Armes and Cloyne?” Kiana asked, quietly.

Sebasto shook his head. “Nothing.”

Numar pulled his waterskin away from his mouth and pointed with his chin towards the other heroes before finally swallowing and asking, “Are you all with Link?”

“Yes,” Time answered. “We were nearby when we found these footprints. We were worried about their vicinity to your village, so we came here to see if you needed any assistance.”

“We need food,” Numar answered immediately. He held his head high and spoke with an air of authority that sounded as fragile as the look in his eyes. “Chumin’s been gathering as much as he can, but it’s not enough. We’ve been able to get some water from the nearby ponds and boil it but we’re running low, we—” He stopped himself with a sharp breath and ran a hand through his hair. “We need something to tide us over until we’re ready to travel to the Lakeside Stable. I don’t know how long that will be, but….”

He took a deep, shuddering breath and looked away for a moment before he muttered. “We never saw something like this coming.”

Time nodded in understanding and gave Numar the time to right his mask.

Kiana asked, “Are we really going to leave Armes and Cloyne out there overnight?”

Sebasto’s frown deepened. “Neither of us are good enough trackers to look for them in the dark without getting lost or hurt ourselves. We’re just going to have to hope they’re okay and stay that way until tomorrow, when we can look again.”

“I can look for them,” Twilight said. “For awhile, at least.”

Kiana’s shoulders relaxed noticeably at that. “Oh, thank you. I’m sorry, what is your name?”

“Rusl. But you can just call me ‘Rancher,’” he replied with a small smile. “Do you have anything that belonged to either of them? There’s a friendly wolf that travels with us sometimes, I could get him to track them by their scents.”

The three Lurelinians exchanged uncertain glances before Sebasto spoke up. “A ‘friendly wolf?’”

“Yeah, he’s practically a pet,” Twilight replied with a wider smile. One that was, perhaps, a little _too_ wide.

As they spoke, Wild turned and walked to the edge of the cliff that faced south. Directly below him, the Yah Rin Shrine sat on a cliff shelf that had, until today, been perched above the village. Now it was perched above the ocean, with waves lapping against the rock face below the Sheikah structure. He frowned down at the shrine’s crown and pondered Kiana’s account of the morning’s events. If she hadn’t been exaggerating or mistaken about the severity of the flooding, then the shrine had been completely submerged in sea water for a time. He didn’t know if that would affect its teleportation capabilities, but he needed to know—and there was only one way to find out.

He pulled up his Sheikah Slate and tapped a few commands onto the screen. A second later, his body was enveloped in the glowing, blue light of Sheikah technology and lifted a foot above the ground. His luminous silhouette unraveled into threads of light that rose up into the sky before dissipating into nothing. Seconds later, those same blue threads materialized from the sky, descended upon the shrine’s landing, and coalesced into the shape of Wild. When the light faded away and left the hero standing, he clambered back up the rock face to the larger plain above and headed back toward the campfires. As he neared them, he noted that the other heroes had set themselves to tasks as well. 

Twilight was making his way up the hill that Sebasto and Numar had come from with a large bell in his hand. Sky and Wind had taken to keeping the children occupied, Four had struck up a conversation with Chumin, and Hyrule seemed to be trying to offer Mubs some water. She gave no sign that she even knew he was there. Legend sat at the campfire with them, watching Hyrule’s efforts. Only Time and Warriors had remained with Kiana, Sebasto, and Numar. Wild rejoined them as Sebasto was in the midst of explaining something.

“—en it was walking away, I saw that it had some kind of fins on its back that looked like leaves or flames.” Sebasto held up both of his hands, palms facing each other and separated by inches, with his fingers splayed apart. “Three rows of them side by side, like this, that ran all the way down its back. Some were _much_ bigger than the others.”

“It had a tail, too,” Numar added, “and it walked like a person—back straight, head up.”

Wild interjected to say, “I can get you all to Lakeside. Tonight.”

Looks of confusion swept across the Lurelinians’ faces. “How?” Sebasto asked.

The Hylian champion held up his Sheikah Slate. “This device can teleport people to the ancient Sheikah Shrines, like the one over there on the cliffside. There’s a shrine behind the Lakeside Stable that’s within sight. I’d have to take you there in pairs, because it can only teleport three people at a time, but I can have you all there in a few minutes.” At his words, a flood of relief spilled out from the three villagers that Wild could practically feel.

“Oh, _thank you,_ Link,” Kiana breathed.

“There’s also a shrine in Hateno Village, that’s where my friends and I are going next. Would you rather go there instead? I can talk to the innkeeper and get you all set up with some rooms for a while.”

Sebasto and Kiana shared a look while Numar said, “Thank you, but I’ll pass. I want to stay close by to try and find…any other missing folks, when the water goes down.”

“And if Rusl can’t find Armes or Cloyne,” Sebasto added, “someone needs to stay here in case they find their way back. Then they can travel to the stable when the way is passable again.”

“Hateno’s too far,” Kiana finally answered. “We’ll want to come back, when the water’s gone. Maybe try to rebuild.”

Sebasto turned to his wife and said, “You should let Link take you and the kids now. They’ve been through a lot today and need to sleep.”

Kiana stepped closer to him and said, quietly, “Come with us too, _please._ They need their father, too.”

He held her gaze, frozen for a moment, until Numar placed a hand on his shoulder and said, “Go on, Sebasto. I’ll stay here and wait. You’ve done more than enough.”

Sebasto nodded and sighed. “Okay.”

* * *

Ten minutes later, Wild reappeared at the Yah Rin Shrine for the third time since that conversation. He clambered back up to the clearing and walked back towards the campfires, where only Numar and the other heroes remained. His chest felt more open and freer than it had in hours, thanks in no small part to the sign of hope he’d just received. During his trips to and from the stable, he’d been apprehensive about relocating Mubs. When he’d come back to the campfires, he’d find that she still hadn’t moved a muscle. He was told that she still hadn’t responded to anyone’s efforts to talk to her. He’d been afraid that she was in no state for teleporting. He’d been afraid that she was too far gone. That she was already lost.

But when her turn finally came, he’d knelt beside her and spoken to her to explain what was about to happen. When he’d asked if she’d understood, she’d actually nodded and stood upright under her own power. After they’d warped, he’d led her to the stable, where she’d looked into his eyes and simply said, “Thank you.”

Maybe she could be okay again after all.

Time saw him approaching and walked out to meet him, far away enough from the others to talk privately. “Are they all settled?”

“Yeah,” Wild nodded. “The stable manager’s taking them in, no cost. They’ll be okay.”

Time nodded back before looking up to the sky, which was still quite orange. “The rancher said he would look for the villagers until two hours after sundown. Told us to go on to your home and get settled in, in the meantime.”

“D’you want to?”

“Yes,” Time replied as he looked back to the other heroes. “They need to eat, and we can start discussing this monster situation.”

Wild followed the old man’s gaze. “How’s Numar doing?”

“He seems to be holding up, given what he’s been through.” Time looked back to Wild. “Is there anything in particular to be worried about?”

“His father’s missing.”

Time gave a quiet hum. “He said he wants to be left here alone tonight, even if the rancher doesn’t find both of the other villagers. We agreed and said we could leave him some food.”

“Okay…then, let’s give him something to hold him over for a couple days and get going.”

Ten minutes and six teleportation trips later, Wild clambered up onto the clearing and approached the campfires once again, now tended to only by Numar, Hyrule, and Epona. As the traveler stood from his spot on the ground, Wild tapped Numar’s shoulder to get his attention and said, “This is my last trip until I come back for Rusl. Are you sure you’ll be okay here by yourself?”

“Yes,” Numar answered with a nod. “I’ll…I’d appreciate some alone time right now.”

Wild nodded. “I’ll be back two hours after sundown. I’ll bring you some extra water.”

After Numar’s simple thanks, Wild pressed some commands on the screen of his Sheikah Slate. With a final tap, the heroes and their horse unraveled and were whisked away.

* * *

The first thing Wild had noticed, when he’d first rematerialized on the landing of the Myahm Agana Shrine with Time and Warriors, was the difference in lighting. Thick storm clouds hung overhead, reaching so far in all directions as to plunge Hateno Village into an early darkness. Now, on arriving with Hyrule and Epona, the rolling drum of thunder could be heard nearby, drawing the two heroes’ attention skyward.

“Looks like it’s gonna be a bad night,” the traveler said.

Wild nodded in agreement. They stepped down from the shrine and headed toward the bridge leading to his house. He ushered Hyrule ahead of himself and Epona and said, “Go on in, I’ll stable her.”

The champion led his friend’s faithful companion to the small stable that sat in his yard and got her settled in for the night. With that done, he made his way to his front door and pushed his way through, finding his comrades spread out around the living space in their casual under-layers.

 _"There_ he is!” Warriors cried cheerfully from where he sat at the table, across from Time and Sky. “I thought I was going to have to restrain the hoarder from clawing through your cupboards to try and make dinner himself!”

From where he stood, leaning against a counter in the kitchen corner, Legend raised an unimpressed eyebrow. “And I thought I was gonna find out just how few magic rings I’d need to put you out of my misery.”

Wild removed his black cloak, hung it on the coat hook by the door, and crossed to the kitchen area to begin making dinner. He took note of where the others had settled themselves: Wind and Four sat side by side on the floor beneath his mounted shields, their backs pressed to the wall. Hyrule had simply laid himself flat on the floor in the corner, his eyes closed and his chest slowly rising and falling.

The heroes exchanged banter while Wild put together a dinner of rice balls, which he then passed out on ceramic plates. The last plate was Hyrule’s, which he set down on the floor beside the traveler’s head before tapping him on the chest. Hyrule awakened instantly, looked about and found the plate, then thanked the cook as he sat up to eat. With his guests served, Wild sat down in the last open seat at the table and dug into his own meal. When all eight heroes had finished eating, Warriors collected everyone’s plates and promptly placed them in the sink.

“Unh unh,” Wild admonished, “I said you’re doing the dishes tonight, Captain, and I meant it.”

Warriors waved his words off with a hand as he returned to his seat beside the cook. “They can wait, we have a bigger problem to deal with first. _So,_ here’s what we know: this thing’s gigantic, walks upright on two legs, and it has two arms, two eyes, one mouth, a tail, and dorsal fins.”

“It came up from the sea,” Time added as the heroes around the outer perimeter of the room gathered around the table. “But neither Kiana, Sebasto, nor Numar had ever heard of anything resembling it in any legends or oral traditions. No folk tales, no songs, myths, anything.”

“Then this thing’s been living in the ocean for goddesses know how long, and _this_ is the first time anyone’s seen it?” Four asked with a frown, his brows furrowed.

“And lived to tell the tale?” Wind suggested with a shrug.

 _“That’s_ interesting,” Legend said with a point toward the young sailor. “Whatever this thing is, it didn’t go out of its way to attack the villagers. So it’s not a bloodthirsty killer like moblins or the other monsters we typically deal with.”

Hyrule’s brows furrowed. “Maybe it’s not actually a _monster?_ Maybe it’s just an animal that’s left its home for some reason?”

“If that’s the case,” Time said, “then we might need to find out _why_ it came ashore and resolve that motivation.”

Wild nodded and said, “Animals typically leave their dwellings to either look for something or to run away from something.”

Legend raised his eyebrows slightly. “Okayyy, setting aside the troubling notion that something _that_ big could be running away from something, what could it be _looking_ for?”

Time answered: “Food, new shelter, or a mate.”

“This is assuming,” Sky interjected, “that its home is, in fact, in those waters.”

Warriors nodded. “He’s right. There are eight Hylians and one horse in this Hyrule right now who do not belong here. What’s to say this creature does?”

“You think the Shadow brought it here?” Four asked.

“That’s certainly a possibility,” Time said. “But bringing us a foe that none of us have ever encountered? That’d definitely mark a change in its tactics.”

Warriors shrugged. “Maybe it’s getting desperate? Like the hoarder said, breaks in patterns mean something big.”

Without taking his eyes off of Warriors, Legend began frantically snapping his fingers at Wild. “Cook, Cook, take a picture of this,” he said urgently as he pointed to Warriors. “The captain _actually_ admitted I know what I’m talking about.”

Warriors returned an unimpressed stare of his own and flatly replied, “Broken clocks.”

“Hey, guys?” Wind spoke up. “I know it’s important to figure out where it’s from and why it’s here, but shouldn’t we be figuring out _what to do_ with it, too?”

Legend looked around the room. “We’ve all fought monsters and foes much bigger than us, right?” He received a medley of agreements. “And I’m going to guess you all killed them by figuring out their weak points and then stabbing them repeatedly, right?” After another, more muted, medley of agreements. Legend nodded and turned to Wind with a smile. “There ya go! We figure out its weak point, we stab it repeatedly, I stab it a bit more, and then problem solved!”

“Veteran.” The sound of Time’s voice drew all eyes to him—and the look on his face. Legend’s facetious demeanor withered under The Glare before the old man said, “Yes, we will have to find and exploit a weakness. But to do that, we will need to examine it first, and that begs the real question: how do we find it?”

 _KRA-BOOM_

All eight heroes startled and snapped their gazes upward. They heard a heavy tap on the roof, followed immediately by another, and another, and another. Within seconds, countless taps grew into the constant assault of a sudden, _heavy_ downpour. The heroes relaxed, and as their nerves settled, the quiet was broken by Hyrule’s voice. 

“Well, maybe we go back and follow the tracks north? I know it’s got a big head start on us, but maybe it’s had to stop somewhere? Long enough for us to catch up?”

“That’s a long shot,” Warriors said with a shake of his head.

“If the monster’s really so big,” Wild pointed out, “then I should be able to see it from a Sheikah Tower somewhere. I could warp to Robbie’s tomorrow morning to grab some ancient arrows, then hop from tower to tower until I can see it. Then I’ll come back here, warp you all to the shrine that puts us the closest to where I saw it, and we can pick up a fresh trail.”

“That might be our only real option,” Time said. “How much longer until you have to go get the rancher?” Wild pulled up his Sheikah Slate and checked the clock, which showed that about an hour and a half had passed since the time the sun usually went down. 

“Half an hour, but I’ll just head out now,” he answered as he rose from his seat. “I told Numar I’d bring him some extra water, and I’ve still gotta feed the rancher.”

Time smirked at that. “I’m sure he’d appreciate it.”

Wild set about making a few more rice balls for Twilight. Next, he looked through his cupboards until he found the extra waterskin he _knew_ he had lying around somewhere and filled it with water from the kitchen pump. After storing the goods in his bottomless pouch, he strode over to the wall where his melee weapons were mounted and stopped before one in particular.

Mipha’s Lightscale Trident.

It shone as brightly as it did in his memories, the precious few he had of her holding it. No, that wasn’t entirely accurate. It shone _brighter_ in his memories, because it could reflect the light that emanated from her. He reached his hand up and traced one fingertip down the shaft. He admired it for a moment longer before turning and walking over to the door. 

“Those dishes better be done when I get back, Captain,” he said as he fastened his cloak around his shoulders and turned to see what Warriors’s response would be. What he saw was a balled up handkerchief flying through the air towards his face, which he easily parried aside with his left hand.

“Your mistake was waiting for me to turn around,” the champion said with a grin before he pulled up his slate, tapped the screen a few times, and disappeared in threads of blue light.

Legend, in particular, relished the look on the captain’s face.


	4. Landslide

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content Warnings: Panic and destruction typical for a kaiju film, implied minor character deaths.

The threads of blue light molded together on the Yah Rin Shrine and solidified into the shape of Wild. He climbed back up to the clearing above the shrine and found that Numar was no longer alone. Armes sat at Numar’s fire—the other had been extinguished at some point after the heroes had left—with his large bell sitting at his side, the both of them simply staring into the middle distance in silence. Their heads perked up when they noticed Wild approaching.

“Glad to see you’re okay,” he said with a nod towards Armes.

The other man nodded back, his movements sluggish. “Thanks. Your friend’s still out there, lookin’ for Cloyne. I don’t…I don’t know how long he’s been gone.”

Wild gave Armes a small smile. “I came back a little early. Why don’t I take you to the others at the stable?”

Armes nodded again. “I’d really like that.”

After getting Armes to the stable, Wild returned to the campfire and sat down beside Numar before retrieving the waterskin from his pouch and handing it to the other man. “Here.”

"Thank you," Numar said with a small smile. He unscrewed the cap and took a small pull, then settled his gaze off into the distance again. 

They sat in silence, leaving Wild to mull over what he knew about the monster. Kiana had called it as big as a god, but the only foe Wild could compare that description to was Ganon’s final form. That thing had been hatred and Malice incarnate, and he’d only been able to defeat it with the help of Zelda’s inner power. It’s immense size would’ve made it dangerous, had it been truly mobile, but it had been content to merely stand in one place, turning about as needed. Instead of trying to chase Wild, Ganon had relied on an energy beam that it could fire from its mouth. The beam had an extensive reach, but that reach was limited by the range of motion of its head. All of these factors, combined, had made it fairly easy to ride circles around Ganon and avoid the danger, so long as he’d maintained his focus. Suffice to say, he had. 

This new monster, however, was a different story entirely.

It was certainly _not_ content to stay in one place. It was mobile and could easily pursue any foe that took it on. Even if it moved as slowly as Ganon had, the mere length of its stride would allow it to keep pace. But, it was certainly not hatred and Malice incarnate. They wouldn’t need Zelda’s inner power. Like Legend had said, they had all defeated foes much larger than themselves on their own. They simply had to find a weakness. One large beast surely wouldn’t prove much trouble for nine Heroes of Courage.

Unless it was infected.

Wild frowned at the thought until movement in the corner of his vision pulled his attention to the edge of the campfire’s light, where Twilight emerged from the darkness alone. 

“I’m sorry, Numar,” he said with a frown. “I found Cloyne’s tracks and followed them, but they stopped at the base of a cliff. I managed to get to the top of it, but I couldn’t pick his trail back up.”

Numar nodded, a frown on his face. “I understand. Thank you for trying, though, and thank you again for finding Armes. We owe you a great deal.”

Twilight shook his head. “It’s nothing.”

“Do you want me to take you to the stable?” Wild asked. He already knew what the answer would be, but he had to be sure regardless. 

“No,” Numar said with a shake of his head, “I’m going to stay here. I’ll try to look for Cloyne tomorrow, maybe the day after. Besides, he might wander back at some point.” He looked off into the distance, into the darkness that surrounded them again. “I can make it to the stable when the water drains back down.”

Wild looked at the other man for a moment before nodding. “All right. Take care of yourself, Numar.”

Numar looked up to him and gave him a small smile. “Thank you, Link.”

Wild looked to Twilight and pointed toward the ocean with a tilt of his head before making his way toward the cliff. He couldn’t help but examine the giant footprint as they passed it by, to try and compare it to the size of Ganon’s hooves. He found it harder to do than he expected. When they reached the cliff’s edge, he retrieved the rice balls from his pouch and offered them to his friend. “Here ya go.”

“Thanks,” Twilight replied as he took them, unwrapped one, and took a large bite. Wild examined the sea below and observed that the water level had lowered noticeably. The two men stared out at the water, listening to its waves break on the cliff below.

“Think the water’ll be back to its usual level in a couple of days,” Wild commented. Twilight hummed in response as he started to munch on his second rice ball. Silence settled on them for a time while they watched the water below. Without turning to face his friend, Wild quietly asked, “Did you find anything you didn’t want to tell Numar? Anything bad?”

“No,” Twilight replied, and Wild felt his shoulders relax a little. “I didn’t find _anything_ after I lost the trail. No signs of a struggle, no blood, not even any tracks from monsters or animals. It’s like he…climbed up the rock face and just kept going up into the sky.”

Despite the circumstances, Wild couldn’t help but smile and huff at the image that came to his mind. The smile melted away as quickly as it came when it occurred to him what came next. “I hate leaving him out there.”

The last bite of Twilight’s rice ball paused inches from his mouth. “Yeah,” he breathed before finishing off his meal with a frown. They stood in silence for a little while longer before he lifted his fists _high_ over his head in a long stretch and said, “All right. Let’s go home. Maybe we can actually get some sleep tonight.”

Wild pulled up his Sheikah Slate and started tapping the screen. “Oh yeah, there’s a really bad thunderstorm in Hateno, so we’re going to get soaked as soon as we get to the shrine.”

“We’ve teleported into worse,” Twilight answered with a shrug. They unravelled into blue threads and flew off into the night, leaving the sea and Numar to their own devices.

* * *

The heroes' senses were assaulted from the moment they rematerialized at the Myahm Agana Shrine. They felt the heavy rain pelting them from above, soaking them to the bone. They heard it pummel the ground, the trees, and the nearby rooftops. They felt the earth _shudder_ beneath their feet, sending them stumbling into each other to catch their balance, and heard a sound that Wild readily recognized from dealing with the Divine Beasts and Ganon: a gigantic footfall. And from the village's thoroughfare, they heard the voices of villagers screaming in terror and heroes shouting directions.

“What the…?” Twilight muttered. Another tremor, stronger than the last, jostled the pair. They looked ahead, out past the tall flagpole that stood directly across from the shrine, and froze at what they saw.

A gargantuan form, barely visible against the black sky and the the heavy downpour, lumbered toward the village from the west. It walked on two legs, swaying with each step, and loomed up into the sky like a tower. Its hips, trunk, and shoulders were as broad as a mountain. Two arms were curled against its sides, each ending in hands and fingers curled almost into fists. Atop its thick neck was a stout muzzle like a dragon’s. It stood so tall that the heroes couldn’t see anything above its maw, and they had to crane their necks up to see even that much. Wild’s eyes widened as he realized that the monster was not close to Ganon’s height at all.

It was almost double.

For a brief moment, a flash of lightning lit up the sky and showed the heroes the true visage of what they faced. Its flesh appeared hard and jagged, as if it were brutally hewn from weathered stone. Its fingers, four on each hand, ended in sharp claws. Its mouth was frozen in a silent snarl, bearing gargantuan teeth to the world that looked like they could chew on a Guardian with ease. The tremor from another of the beast’s steps brought the heroes back to their senses.

“The others are probably already trying to stop it,” Twilight said to Wild, “I’ll try to help them. You go help evacuate the villagers!”

“But—”

“They know you, Champion, you’ll do more good for them than any of us will!”

Wild paused for only a second before nodding. They bolted down the pathway to the main road and split up, Wild heading into the heart of the village while Twilight drew his sword and shield and headed toward the gate. Ahead, the rancher could see Time, Warriors, Hyrule, and Legend already running towards the beast. When Twilight's brain caught up with his actions, he wondered if charging in with swords would really be of any use against something of that size.

He got his answer when Time ran up to the space between two of the massive toes on the beast’s right foot and unleashed the great spin. He briefly disappeared in a flash of magic light and a shower of sparks flung about by the blade of his greatsword scraping against the beast’s hide. Despite the spectacular display, the beast gave no indication that it'd even noticed the attack. Warriors sheathed his own blade and pulled out a spinner before mounting it and beelining straight for another of the beast’s toes. He leaned the spinner back and thrust its tip forward as he boosted its spin, striking the claw with a drill attack—only to rebound off in another shower of sparks, the change in momentum sending the captain flying off the spinner to land on his back.

Before either Legend or Hyrule even had a chance to make their moves, the creature’s foot lifted, drifted through the air, and crashed back down onto the mud much closer to the village—and to Twilight. The rancher sheathed his own blade and sprinted toward the foot, not drawing his next weapon until he was in striking distance: his trusty ball and chain. Just as he pulled it from his adventuring pouch, Warriors appeared from behind the monster’s foot and dismounted his spinner.

“Get ahead of us!” the captain yelled to the others behind him as he stashed his spinner, donned a pair of golden-armored gauntlets like the old man's, and drew a ball and chain of his own—one detailed in numerous gold spikes. “Get to where it’s _going_ to be standing!”

Time, Legend, and Hyrule ran past them towards the village, none losing their step as the ground quaked beneath them. Twilight and Warriors met each other’s gazes and nodded before they both swung their chains over their heads and flung them forwards, sending the heavy, spiked orbs at the other ends crashing against the monster’s toes. With two mighty _clangs,_ they bounced off and dropped to the mud. Twilight watched the foot lift into the air and drift away with a heavy scowl on his face.

“Move!!” Warriors yelled as he stowed away his weapon and gauntlets before running toward the village. “We’ve gotta stay ahead of its tail!!” Twilight looked to his left and saw the massive tail in question drawing closer. It roamed about unpredictably, weaving dangerously low to the ground. Twilight stowed his ball and chain and ran, pushing himself with all of his lower body strength to keep pace with Warriors and the creature’s massive stride.

After separating from Twilight, Wild ran up the main road towards the inn, where he could see the tail end of a group of people fleeing towards the path that led up to the ancient tech lab. One person at the back, a man, tripped and fell. Two women, one holding a child in her arms, turned back and screamed for him. Wild recognized them as the family that owned the East Wind general store. He scooped down to grab Pruce’s arm and help him up.

“I got ya Pruce, come on!” Wild grunted as he helped him up. A cacophony of shattering stone and wood made them look back, where they saw the beast’s left foot crushing Ventest. Amira screamed, clutching her son Azu’s head to her shoulder, and Wild turned forward again and pushed Pruce toward the inn. “Go, go, get to…." It suddenly occurred to Wild that, if the residents of Hateno had some kind of evacuation plan in the event of catastrophe, or agreed-upon rallying points, or anything of the sort, he’d never learned them. He finally settled on, “Get out of here, we’ve gotta move!”

He kept pace behind them as they ran for the wooden footbridge leading out of town to the southeast. He looked back and saw Legend running after them, as if in pursuit, until the veteran stopped and turned around to face the monster head-on. Wild turned his eyes forward again and saw Seldon and Sky ushering villagers through the archway ahead. As the three of them fell in behind the villagers crossing the bridge, Legend placed his shield on his back. He reached into the collar of his tunic and pulled out his necklace of medallions, his hand firmly wrapped around one.

“All right, you overgrown lizalfos,” the veteran muttered, channeling his magic into the blade of the Tempered Sword. “Let’s see how you like _this!"_ He spun his weapon about in an empowered flourish, bursts of flame spiraling out from around him, and slashed through the air towards the monster. His Bombos medallion took effect immediately, hammering the beast with numerous explosions that rocked the earth below. Blast after blast after blast after blast punched into the beast’s hide.

But the monster strode on, unphased. Legend growled as he took hold of his Ether medallion—but the traveler was already a step ahead of him. Hyrule ran to a position out of the beast’s path, held the Magical Sword up to the sky, and called upon some magic of his own. The Thunder spell brought bolts of lightning down from the sky, all of which converged on the beast in sparkling cracks that made the nearby heroes’ ears ring. The powerful assault, and the electricity that crackled over the creature’s wet hide, brought it to a halt, its shoulders and neck curling inward. Hyrule grinned, but his victory was short-lived.

For then the monster reared back its head, opened its jaws to the sky, and _roared_. It roared an apocalyptic shriek of pain and fury and _doom._ Legend let out a pained cry of his own and covered his ears with his hands, falling to a knee and scrunching his eyes shut. He felt his bones rattle in his body, he felt the very air in his chest compress so tightly that he almost feared he’d stop breathing. When the roar finally ceased, Legend opened his eyes and gasped in deep, greedy lungfuls of air until the captain’s voice caught his attention.

 _“HOARDER MOVE!!!”_ Legend looked up, and his eyes widened when he saw the beast’s foot falling towards him. He grabbed his sword off the ground and _pushed_ his Pegasus boots to their limits, bolting down the street because his life _did_ depend on it. He ran and ran and ran until the foot crashed down _just_ behind him. The impact sent the veteran head over feet onto the muddy street. Legend pushed himself up onto his hands and looked at the heel that had almost ended him, until he felt a hand wrap around his arm and drag him to his feet.

" _Move_ Veteran, move move _move!!”_ Time yelled as he dragged Legend aside. Behind them, the giant’s tail swung through a building on the south side of the road and sent wreckage _flying_ through the air.

On the winding paths leading up the hillside, Wild, Sky, and the villagers they followed came to a branch in the road; one way led to the Hateno Pasture, and the other to the Hateno Ancient Tech Lab. Four stood at the fork, ushering the villagers down the path to the lab. 

“Where’s your friend?!” Seldon asked Four as the smith fell in beside them.

“Up ahead, directing people to the beach!” Four yelled. As they ran uphill, Wild looked back over his right shoulder and saw the beast standing with one foot in the wreckage of what was once the Great Ton Pu Inn. The other foot was moving up to step onto the side of the hill below the pasture. Wild’s eyes darted up to the ancient tech lab that overlooked the village then back to the titan, its flesh gnarled, and dark, and—

His eyes widened with the stroke of an idea. Without breaking stride, he turned to the Chosen Hero and said, “Sky, give me the Master Sword!”

Sky looked back to the champion with a rare, sharp look in his eyes. “Why?!”

“I have an idea and I need the right weapon!”

“You have _plenty_ of weapons!”

“Now’s not the time, Sky,” Four cut in, “give him the sword!”

Sky only hesitated for a second before he loosened his baldric and lifted it over his head, handing the sword to Wild by the scabbard with a warning: “You take care of her!”

“Of course!” Wild yelled as he took the sword and strapped it into position on his back. He pulled up his slate and tapped a few commands on the screen before threads of blue light descended from the sky ahead of them. They merged together on the road and formed a two-wheeled contraption made of ancient Sheikah technology. Whatever it was, its design was evocative of a horse. Seldon was so startled by the sight that he would’ve stopped running, had Sky not pushed him from behind. 

“What is _that?!”_ he managed to gasp out.

“My mount!” Wild replied before sprinting ahead and hopping onto the Master Cycle, revving the engine, and speeding up the road in a spray of water and mud. He turned the last corner of the trail and shot up towards the lab, his face battered by wind and rain. The monster drew closer on his left side, towering over the pathway, and only then did Wild notice that it was staring directly _at_ the lab.

Then the creature’s back began to glow.

Its dorsal fins emanated a shimmering, sky-blue light that nearly illuminated the entire village. Wild felt the bottom of his chest drop away, and he brought the cycle to a sudden stop. He watched in horror as the monster opened its mouth, leaned forward, and spewed a vast, blue shaft of light from its jaws. Wild’s eyes followed it as it streaked through the air and collided into the tech lab with a thunderous explosion. The building vanished in a flash of fire, pieces flying through the air and the ground rumbling with the blast. The blue light vanished as quickly as it’d appeared and left nothing but burning wreckage.

 _“Purah!!”_ Wild cried, his plan all but forgotten, before he gunned the cycle up the trail. He felt the hill _jolt_ and _shake_ beneath him but paid it no mind. He didn’t stop until he reached the ruins of the lab, where he sprang from the cycle and ran towards the rubble. “Purah!! Symin!!”

When he received no answer, Wild turned to face the beast, only to find that it had turned its back to the lab and was walking away. He glared at it with a snarl before looking around for something, _anything,_ that would give him a solution. He found one when his eyes settled on a nearby slab of debris, large enough to use as a bed, that now lay angled on a rock. Wild rushed to the slab and pulled a stack of ten bomb arrows from his quiver before piling them underneath the slab like fire kindling. Then, he added another stack of ten bomb arrows. Then he added another, and then another, and _another, and another._ Finally, he materialized his two remote bombs and tucked them into the nest he’d made. Another of the giant’s steps nudged Wild to hurry. He stood, changed the active rune on his Sheikah Slate, and used stasis to lock the slab in place. He turned and ran, putting distance between himself and the flashing, yellow debris as he changed the active rune once again and detonated the bombs.

The explosion shook the ground, almost knocking him off his feet. He couldn’t tell if the high-pitched tones he could hear were from the rapidly counting stasis or the tinnitus, but he ran back to the slab regardless. He managed to leap on and grab hold of it just before it launched into the air.

Wild felt his heart plunge into his stomach, he felt the wind and the rain fly past him as he flew through them, and he felt the rubble begin to tumble. The thick storm clouds let no moon or starlight shine through, so he only had the rolling pull of gravity on his bones and innards to tell him that he was hurtling through the air end over end, over end, over end, over end. He held onto the rubble for dear life, clinging on through sheer force of will alone, even as he felt his fingers slipping on its soaked edges. 

He just had to hold on until the _right_ moment, just until then, _just until then._

That moment was when he felt the slab reach the apex of its arc. With a grunt, Wild pushed himself off, unfurled his paraglider, and steered about to orient himself before his eyes found the back of the monster’s neck directly ahead of him. He put himself on a direct course, his altitude dropping as he drew closer and expertly steered the paraglider about to come at the creature’s dorsal fins from the side. When he was seconds away from colliding into one, he stowed away the glider and let himself fall onto the fin.

He grabbed onto its upper edge with his arms, his feet scrambling for purchase against the side. Just as he found it, the giant’s next step reverberated throughout its body. Wild nearly lost his tenuous grip, but he drew from his _ample_ supply of will and held on. He climbed along the giant fin’s edge until he was able to plant his right foot against the monster’s back for support. Keeping his grip on the fin with his left hand, he drew the Master Sword with his right, raised it over his head, and swung it down onto the creature’s flesh.

The blade clanged off harmlessly.

Wild froze, his gaze locked on the giant’s hide where there _should_ have been an open sword wound. He struck the beast again—and again, the Blade of Evil’s Bane made nothing so much as a scratch. Wild looked to the sword, then back to where the blade had made contact, then back to the _Sword That Seals the Darkness_ again. He snarled and struck the beast again and again and again and again, the result the same with every swing. He swung and swung and swung until he suddenly heard a ceaseless _crackling_ from his right hand. He looked at the sword and only had _just_ enough time to realize what was about to happen.

Then lightning struck the blade and stopped Wild’s heart.

His body blasted away from the monster’s back in a shower of sparks and plummeted toward the earth below. A pink, winged ball of light emerged from his adventuring pouch and raced down beside him, swirling about his body at a speed no Hero of Courage had ever seen a fairy fly before. It shrank and faded from the world, disappearing completely as Wild opened his eyes. He was only in the world of the living long enough to realize that he was falling when he hit the ground with a sickening _crunch._ His body bounced and tumbled along the ground until it finally came to a stop, where another fairy emerged to set about its task.

But unlike any other time a fairy had revived a dead hero, Wild did not awaken straight away. He lay there undisturbed, even by the thunderous footsteps of the monster as it walked away, unaware of all his efforts.


	5. Aftermath

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content Warnings: Description of the aftermath of a natural disaster, including the emotional turmoil of personal loss and grief.
> 
> If you're the 00.0001% of readers who needed the CW's on chapter 3, this one is meant to be even worse.

Wild awoke to the sight of an unfamiliar, wooden ceiling above him and a comfortable mattress beneath him. The distant sounds of people speaking and moving about reached his ears from somewhere across the room, below. He looked to his right and squinted against the daylight pouring through a window further down the wall. Someone wearing the distinct clothing of the Sheikah stood with their back to him while they tended to someone else in another bed. A familiar voice spoke up from the direction of his feet.

“Champion?” Wild lifted his head and looked down between his socks to find Twilight, dressed down to his undershirt, leaning against the railing of a loft. When their eyes met, the rancher turned around and leaned over the railing to call out below, “Old Man, he’s awake.”

The voices that drifted up from the lower floor quieted and the Sheikah appeared at Wild’s bedside immediately. She was none other than Nanna, the first person Wild had met when he’d first ridden into Kakariko Village so long ago.

“Hello Master Link,” she said with a smile. “I’m glad to see you’ve returned to us.”

With a grunt, Wild pushed himself up and swung his feet out of the bed, Nanna holding his arms in a gentle grip until he was seated upright and steady. His loose hair spilled about his shoulders, and he looked down to find that he’d been dressed down to his undershirt as well. He cast a glance at his right palm and found a new layer of lightning scars atop the ones he’d already earned in his quest. He lifted his head and found that Time, dressed down to his gambeson, had joined the gathering.

“How long was I out?” Wild asked the room.

“It’s been almost eighteen hours since the lab was destroyed,” Time answered. “What happened?”

Wild blinked in silence while he searched through the mist in his head. When he finally found the answer, he said, “I took the Master Sword from Sky…. I ha— I had an idea. I thought it could…I thought it could hurt the monster. It’s the _Sword That Seals the Darkness,_ right? So I got onto its back and hit it, but the sword…it did nothing. And then…I think there was…lightning? And then, I think…the sword _s_ _poke_ to me. But not with words, or a voice, it…I _felt_ what it was saying. It said something like, like…’this is no evil.’” He fell silent again, his eyes locked on something only he could see. Time and Twilight exchanged a look as Nanna stepped before the champion and pulled his focus towards her.

“I’m sorry to interrupt,” she said, “but this really shouldn’t wait any longer. Let me get a good look at your eyes.” She crouched down until their eyes were level and held up a finger before his face. “Follow my finger with your eyes, do not move your head.”

Wild complied, following the paths her finger cut across his vision, until he finally asked, “How did you get here, Nanna?”

“Purrah brought me here last night.”

Wild’s eyes snapped to Nanna’s, several questions clamoring in his head. The one that made it out of his mouth first was, “Purah’s okay?!”

“She’s fine,” Twilight said. Wild turned to look at him, but Nanna firmly grabbed his chin and turned his head back to her. After sternly reiterating her instructions, she resumed her exam while the rancher continued. “She and her assistant hid in a bunker under their lab when they saw the monster approaching.”

Wild looked into Nanna’s eyes again and asked, “But how did she get you here?”

“A lot has happened since you’ve been here last,” she replied before standing upright and telling him to do the same. Wild stood, relieved to find himself as steady on his feet as usual. Nanna ordered him to turn around in a circle and watched him do so as she continued. “The princess discovered sources of knowledge that were previously lost. Thanks to that knowledge, Purah and Robbie have been able to create new Sheikah Slates.”

After finishing his turn, Wild looked her in the eyes again. “New slates?”

Nanna looked the hero up and down. “Well, you seem to be okay. Take things slow, for a time, until you’re sure that you can do more. But yes, new slates. They’ve made three, and Purah has been using one to ferry people and supplies back and forth between here and Kakariko since the monster left.”

“Is she here?” Wild asked as he walked over to the railing and looked down to the living space below. Dozens of villagers huddled together in seated groups throughout the room. Others were laid out in bedrolls. Two Sheikah walked about and kneeled to check on each group or bedroll as they passed.

“No, she’s in Kakariko. She should be returning soon.” As Nanna spoke, Wild saw Four emerge from directly beneath the loft carrying a tray of bowls filled with soup.

While the smith crossed the room below, Wild turned to Twilight and asked, “Where are the others?”

Time answered first. “The traveler’s right here, resting.”

Wild turned back around and discovered that the other bed was occupied by Hyrule. His eyes were closed, breathing steady, and feet bare; his boots were neatly placed by the foot of the bed. Wild had a hunch that it wasn’t the traveler himself who’d put them there.

“Poor guy was up all night,” Twilight added. “Tore through our supply of green potions to try and heal everyone that he could.”

“The smith and the sailor are helping out below. The captain, the veteran, and Sky are…” Time trailed off with a frown, and when he finally spoke, his words were gentle. “Digging in the pasture.”

Wild felt a hand of stone wrap around his heart and a hand of flesh settle on his shoulder. From behind him, he heard Twilight whisper, “I’m sorry, Champion.”

When he tried to speak, he felt the words impeded by the grip in his chest. He dug deeper for his second try and managed to push them through. “How many?”

“Three,” Time said softly.

“None of them were children,” Twilight cut in. “They’re all okay.”

The sound of a child sobbing aloud below seemed to undermine that assurance, but Wild knew what his friend really meant. He took a deep, quiet breath before throwing another look around the home. “Whose house are we in?”

There was a pause, one that simmered with a kind of tension that Wild did not miss. Neither did he miss the look that passed between the old man and the rancher, both of whom kept their faces neutral.

“Someone named Rhodes,” Time finally answered.

Wild looked into Time’s eye for any clue as to what wasn’t being said, but he already felt the truth. “Why are we here?”

The old man didn’t answer immediately. Finally, he said, “It’s one of the only houses that wasn’t damaged.”

“How many others are there?”

The flat line of Time’s mouth bowed into a frown. “Just one.”

The hand around Wild’s heart squeezed. “The other one’s not mine, is it.”

Time’s frown deepened and his brows fell into gentle slopes. “No. It’s not.”

Wild felt the hands that held him in their grip—both the one on his heart and the one on his shoulder—tighten as Twilight said, for the second time, “I’m sorry.”

He stood there processing the news for a moment before he looked over to the bed he’d awoken in. Sure enough, his boots were placed beside it as neatly as Hyrule’s. He stepped away from Twilight’s grip, crossed over to them at a brisk pace, and snatched them up as he sat on the edge of the bed.

“Champion?” Time asked, but Wild didn’t look away from the boot he was pulling on his left foot.

His response left no room for discussion: “I need to see.”

Once both boots were on, he crossed the loft and descended the stairs, the two older heroes right behind him. He made his way toward the front door, pushing through air that was thick with grief. The tremoring voices he heard as he passed stabbed hooks into his heart and pulled it, as if to rip it in three. When he placed his hand on the door, a child’s wail cut through the entire house and froze Wild in place. He looked to his left and saw, once again, the family that owned the East Wind general store—but they were now one person fewer.

Amira and Ivee sat beside each other on the floor, their backs pressed against the wall. They were huddled, with tears in their eyes, around the young Azu, whose breath hitched with sobs and hiccups. Wild could faintly hear Ivee muttering, “I know, I know, I— I want him too, I want Papa too—” When her grief swallowed her words whole, the champion turned and pushed his way through the door, with Time and Twilight on his heels. The rancher pushed the door closed behind him and silenced the whimpers and whispers.

Wild only made it three steps before he froze in place.

It wasn’t what he saw that made him stop. It wasn’t the sight of buildings and silos reduced to piles of rubble and debris. It wasn’t the open air where there had once been roofs and chimneys. It wasn’t the jagged bones of stone and wood that had once been people’s homes.

It was the quiet that stopped him.

There was no distant hum of conversation. There was no laughter of playing children. There was no music wafting through open windows or blaring from front porches. There was no thrum of life in this village—one that had survived a hundred years under the terror of the Calamity, only to be flattened in a single night.

All he could hear was the faint sounds of birdsong, flowing water, and the breeze, and none of these things took note of what had happened the night before.

Wild took a breath and pressed on down the path. Uma’s home still stood to his left, intact but quiet. He saw shadows moving about through the window, so it was being used for _something,_ but he paid that little mind and continued downhill. The wooden footbridge and the archway above it were both untouched, and the three heroes crossed it in silence. Wild stopped before the ruins of the Great Ton Pu Inn and looked up to where its balcony had once overlooked the town. Through the empty space it had left behind, he could now see the winding pathways up to the smoking ruins of the ancient tech lab. His brows furrowed at the sight of a long gouge that had been carved horizontally into the hillside like a scar.

The question must have been legible on his face, because Time provided an answer. “The monster’s tail did that when it turned around. After it destroyed the lab.”

“The monster’s tail did a lot of this,” Twilight added quietly.

Wild said nothing. He turned around and made his way over the small, stone bridge, following the main road. The viscera of the villagers’ homes and businesses flanked him on either side, with trails of wreckage strewn across the road like streaks of blood. As he passed, he looked to what was left of each building. He took care to step over the detritus that littered his path, to disturb as few of the remains as possible. It took him seconds to walk down that road. It took him months to walk down that road. In actuality, it took him only minutes to reach the hill leading up to the Myahm Agana Shrine. 

Atop the hill, he saw the wreckage of what had once been the model homes of Bolson Construction. They lay in pieces, slashed and smashed and bashed by what looked like pieces of the village’s more traditional homes. A lone figure stood at the head of the trail, staring at the colorful carnage. His distinct attire left no doubt as to who he was. Wild slowly approached the man from the side, trying to avoid startling him, and quietly said, “Bolson?”

Bolson turned to face him, revealing deep lines in his cheeks, heavy bags under his eyes, and a glassy, utterly, lost look in his eye that reminded Wild of Kiana. His eyes cleared at the sight of his friend, even if only a little. “Link, darling,” he said with the closest thing resembling a smile he could manage. “I”m so glad you’re awake. Karson and I were worried sick the whole night after they brought you in.”

“Where is he?”

“Oh, he’s…he’s back at Rhodes’s house, under the loft. Poor dear broke his leg when that thing—” He flinched and looked away, directing his gaze to the ground. After a moment, he swallowed whatever he’d almost said and met Wild’s eyes again. “He’ll be okay. They’re giving him elixirs to help with the pain.”

“What about you?”

“Oh I’m _fine_ , darling, really. I’m just….” Bolson turned back to the colorful houses that were now just sticks and dust and took a long, deep breath before blowing it out in a sigh. “We worked really hard on these. To give people shelter. To protect them, and liven their days up, too.” He took another shuddering breath and his voice wavered. “We can rebuild them. Of course we can, they’re just wood and nails and, and…. They can be rebuilt. I just…we just….”

Bolson shook his head and looked up into the sky, his eyes now glassy with moisture. He let out another sigh, turned to Wild with that lost look in his eyes, and shrugged. When his words finally came, they sounded like a plea for answers: “We never saw this coming.” 

He lowered his head again and brought one of his hands up to grasp it. His breathing hitched in his chest and he worked to bring it under control. Wild placed a hand on his shoulder and gave it a firm squeeze. Time and Twilight shared a look and turned away, giving the two Hatenoans a measure of privacy. They all stood there for a time, kept company by each other and the sound of grief. Eventually, Bolson regained his composure and blew out another sigh. 

“Sorry about that, dear. I’m a mess.”

Wild shook his head. “Don’t be sorry.”

Bolson’s mouth shrank and his eyes widened. “Are you…checking on your home?”

Wild took his hand off Bolson’s shoulder and took a deep breath himself. “My friends already told me. I’m just…I need to see it.”

Bolson nodded and grasped both of Wild’s arms. “We’ll get it back on its feet in no time. Bigger and better, with vintage style and everything, if you want.”

Wild smiled. “Thank you.”

The carpenter returned his smile and patted his arm before turning and walking back towards the main road. Wild turned the other way and let his smile fall. With a deep breath, he started forward, his comrades following behind him. He saw the wooden bridge that, less than a day earlier, he’d crossed with Hyrule and—

_!!!_

Wild whipped around, his eyes wide. _“Epona!!_ Is she okay?!”

Time and Twilight stopped short for a moment before the latter held up his hands and said, “She’s okay, she’s okay! She’s back at Rhodes’s house; if you’d turned right instead of left after leaving, you’d’ve seen her around the corner.”

Wild let out a sigh of _relief_ for once and nodded. When his heart-rate returned to a more normal pace, he turned back around and resumed his trek—until the sight across the bridge brought him to a halt again.

He’d known his house was gone, as a matter of fact. But knowing with one’s mind and knowing with one’s heart were two different affairs. Only then, with the remains of his home before him and the silence of a broken world around him, did he know with his heart.

The entire house had been toppled. Something about the sight seemed particularly off to Wild, but it took a few moments to realize what it was: much of the debris he saw was not from _his_ house, but from another’s. He wondered how that had happened, given how removed from the village his home was, until Twilight’s words about the monster’s tail returned to his mind.

Regardless of the how, the result was the same.

Wild steeled his shoulders and crossed the bridge, Time and Twilight following behind. He walked to the edge of the ruins and simply looked down at the timber and stone. He felt pressure growing in his chest, like a slowly expanding octo-balloon, but he stamped it down. He slowly walked around the perimeter of the wreckage and tried to ignore the phantom memories that drifted through his head. The sound of laughter he and his fellow heroes had shared. The warmth of a boiling pot of water and the smell of chopped vegetables. The echoes of eight people steadily breathing in relaxed sleep.

Every step felt heavier than any sledgehammer or any boulder. The pressing and the stabbing and the squeezing in his chest threatened to stop him at any moment, but he stuffed them all down into a trunk and pressed on. When he turned the southwest corner of what used to be his house, a glint of light in the rubble caught his eye. He stepped closer and looked down to see a piece of metal barely peeking out from a nest of broken wood and stone. His heart stopped in his chest and a band of iron snapped around his throat like a snare trap when he realized that the metal before him was no simple iron or steel.

It was peerless silver and ruby.

Wild threw himself onto his knees and flung aside piece after piece of wreckage until he uncovered the painful truth. He froze, his eyes fixed on the object of his despair.

It was the three-pronged head of Mipha’s trident.

Bent, twisted.

Warped, malformed.

Broken.

He closed his hands around it with the care reserved for a small, injured animal. He lifted the head out of the wreckage, the shaft nowhere to be seen. He looked down at what was left of her prized possession and could no longer fight the pressing, or the stabbing, or the squeezing.

The first sob was stopped by the iron band around his throat, but his chest pushed against it. It pushed and pushed and pushed until a sound came out so choked and strained that neither Twilight nor Time were sure of what it was. A second, choked gasp brought the two heroes to full attention. Then the iron band broke and released a flood as Wild cradled the broken trident-head to his chest and curled inward, weeping openly.

Twilight rushed over to his friend’s side and knelt beside him as he reached into the collar of his shirt, Twili magic enveloping him and dissipating to reveal his wolf form. He nudged Wild’s shoulder with his head, and the younger hero threw his arms around Twilight’s neck with the desperation of a drowning man, burying his face in wolf fur. 

Time stood nearby, frozen and helpless as the birds sang, the streams flowed by, and the breeze passed through, all inattentive to the young man’s pain.

* * *

In Hateno Pasture, the indifferent sounds of nature were broken by the sounds of labored breathing and shuffling dirt. Three young men stood in three long holes, each carving out scoops of soil with a shovel and flinging them aside onto three growing piles. The holes they were digging were seven feet long, three feet wide, and three feet deep.

When the digging was eventually finished, they would be six feet deep.

These three young men had been digging for almost two hours, carrying on the work started by some of the surviving villagers. Their shift was the third. They’d worked in silence, stopping frequently for water breaks, and walked a tightrope act. They couldn’t push themselves too hard—digging a grave was hard work that would leave anyone tired and sore, and these three heroes needed to be in fighting shape. But they all wanted to complete as much of the task as possible, too—to leave as little for the villagers to do as possible.

They had been through enough.

Sky thrust his shovel straight into the ground, leaving it to stand upright like a signpost. He climbed out of the grave and walked over to three nearby piles of tunics, weapons, and gear, each topped by a nearly flat waterskin. He grabbed his, unscrewed the cap, and drained the last drops, tilting his head back and lifting the skin high. He swallowed and turned to his friends, whose breathing was as heavy as his.

“My water’s gone,“ he said. “How is yours?”

Warriors stabbed his shovel into the ground like Sky’s and turned to the Chosen Hero, motioning with his hand. “Toss me mine.”

Sky snatched Warriors’s waterskin up and sent it sailing through the air. The captain caught it with ease and pulled from it while Legend set aside his shovel and leaned against the grave’s edge on his hands.

“Mine’s gone, too,” the veteran said.

“Why didn’t you say something sooner?” Sky asked.

“It could wait.”

Warriors lowered his skin and directed a mild glare at Legend before he screwed the cap back on and tossed it back to Sky. “Now I’m out.”

The Skyloftian caught the water skin and grabbed Legend’s off of his pile as he said, “I’ll go fill these back up.”

“Check on the cook too, while you’re at it,” Legend replied as Sky started walking away.

“Of course!”

“All right,” Warriors said before Legend could grab his shovel, “come on, we’re taking a break.” He climbed out of the grave and sat on the grass, the veteran doing the same without a fight. They each pulled a rag from their belts and mopped off the sweat that slithered down their faces and necks. Warriors kept an eye on Legend, who stared off into space with furrowed brows. When they’d both caught their breaths, the captain tilted his chin up toward the younger hero and said, “Rupee for your thoughts, Hoarder?”

That visibly pulled Legend back to the real world. “I’m just thinking about how to deal with that thing.”

The captain’s brows rose. “Have you ever faced anything that big before?”

“No, biggest enemy I ever dealt with was less than half that size.”

“Likewise. Ganon?”

“No, a general named Onox who was actually a dragon.”

“How’d you beat him?”

Legend’s mouth thinned and he lowered his gaze before quietly and hesitantly saying, “I figured out his weak point and...stabbed it repeatedly.”

Warriors recognized the opening to needle the veteran for the words he'd spoken the night before, but merely nodded. “Did anything you saw last night stand out to you?”

Legend looked up and held his gaze in silence before he finally said, “No. I saw the old man use that high-powered spin attack and you use your spinning thing, and all you got was a little light show. It’s probably safe to say its feet’re not weak points.”

Warriors nodded. “It didn’t react when the rancher and I hit its toes with our spiked flails, either.”

“Okay, then it’s _definitely_ safe to say its feet’re not weak points.” Legend interlocked his fingers and leaned his mouth against his hands. “We might have to presume that its hide is invulnerable to physical weapons.”

“Meaning we have a gohma or a king dodongo situation.”

“Maybe. If so, how exactly do we get that high up to shoot its eyes or get a bomb in its mouth?”

“Maybe the champion can repeat that catapult stunt of his,” Warriors offered with a smirk.

Legend snorted and snickered. When he finished, his grin slowly melted into a small frown. “He’s going to tear himself to _shreds_ over this.”

Warriors’s smirk also fell. “Yeah. Yeah, he is.”

They both sat there, sifting through their own thoughts—until Legend’s eyes slowly widened. “It had an objective,” he breathed.

“What?”

“It wasn’t sowing random chaos and destruction,” Legend said before turning his torso about and pointing up at the top of the hill, where the ancient tech lab had stood. “It came here to destroy _that_ building specifically, then it turned around and _left._ It’s not a bloodthirsty killer, like I said last night, it came here for a _reason.”_

Warriors mulled this information over. “Then…this thing is intelligent?”

Legend’s brows furrowed again. “I don’t know. It’s definitely not kidnapping oracles and making speeches about power, but it might be smarter than your average bear or wolf. However smart it is, it came here to destroy _that lab_ and then went off somewhere else. Somewhere further inland.”

Warriors looked to the west, where the monster had headed after destroying the lab. ”You think it’s heading toward _another_ objective?”

After a brief pause, Legend nodded. “Yeah. If we want to catch up to this thing, or get ahead of it, we need to know what it’s after. And to figure that out, we need to find out what brought it _here.”_ Both heroes looked up to the top of the hill, where the ancient tech lab lay in ruins, then turned back to each other. 

Warriors nodded his head as he gave voice to their shared thought: “And we know _just_ who to ask.”

* * *

Threads of glowing, blue light materialized in the sky and descended upon the Myahm Agana Shrine, where they melded into the forms of three Sheikah. On the sides were the guards Dorian and Cado, with large traveling packs on their backs. In the center was their much smaller companion, Purah the scientist, with a Sheikah Slate in her hands. All three of the new arrivals started when they saw who awaited them.

Wild stood mere feet away from the Shrine’s teleportation pad, with his hair still hanging loose about his shoulders and the broken head of Mipha’s trident in his right hand. Twilight and Time stood behind him on both sides.

Both parties stood there for a moment, examining each other.

By Purah’s estimation, Wild’s eyes were red and his face haggard, making him look a good fifteen years older than he’d been when placed in the Shrine of Resurrection. For his part, Wild saw none of the zest and energy that Purrah normally exuded. Though she still looked for all the world like an eight year-old child, he could see all of her one hundred-plus years in her eyes, even when the corners of her mouth curled up into the smallest of smiles.

“It’s good to see you, Link,” she said as she stepped off the teleportation pad and waved him down towards her with both hands. “Now come down here so I can hug you.”

The corners of his own mouth curling up a little, he walked forward and kneeled down low enough for her to wrap her arms around his neck and set her chin on his shoulder. His arms wrapped around her as he said, “It’s good to see you, too.”

They squeezed each other, Purrah humming for a moment before she said, “Tighter.” He complied, earning a louder hum. “Tighter. Now pull up. Up, up, up up _upupupupup—_ ” An audible _pop_ from her lower back coincided with a soft gasp of relief from Purah. _“Oh,_ that’s much better.” They pulled apart and looked at each other with relief in their eyes and their hearts, until the small smile on Purah’s face melted away. “Walk with us. We have supplies for the villagers.”

Wild nodded and stood. The six of them began their trek in silence, the graveyard they passed through dispelling any urge to speak with a solemn authority. When they reached the stretch of the path between the two surviving houses, Purah brought the others to a stop and pointed to Rhodes’s home. 

“The survivors are housed here,” she said. “The other home is for the deceased.” Dorian and Cado nodded and proceeded to Rhodes’s front door. Purah turned to Wild with eyes that somehow seemed even older and said, “We have a lot to discuss, and I’d rather only discuss it once. Gather the other heroes and meet me at my lab.”

“I’ll get the ones who’re here,” Twilight said before turning and following the Sheikah. Wild, Purah, and Time made their way up the path towards the hilltop, as silent as when they’d traveled through the village itself. At the first fork in the road, Time broke away toward Hateno Pasture. Wild and Purah continued on, neither making a sound beside their footsteps. Wild’s eyes instinctively rose up to the lab and his mind stumbled at the sight of open sky and rubble. 

“I thought you were gone,” he said.

“I’m sorry.”

Wild shook his head. “It wasn’t your fault.”

“It was, actually. Probably.”

He looked to his friend with furrowed brows. “What do you mean?”

“Like I said, I’d rather only discuss it once. There’s a lot to explain.”

Silence reigned again as they drew closer to the ruins of the lab. As they neared the teleportation pad, Symin emerged from the rubble with his gaze firmly locked on a notepad in his hand. He scribbled notes into it with a pencil until he finally looked up and came to a stop. “Oh, Link! I’m glad to see you awake, how are you feeling?”

Wild’s mind stumbled over how to answer, until his mouth took the initiative to say, “I’m alive.”

That didn’t seem to be the response Symin had expected, and his mouth worked soundlessly for a second before he said, “Well...I’m glad.”

“Go back to the house, Symin,” Purah said. “Get something to eat and catch some sleep.”

Symin frowned down at the smaller scientist. “You need to do the same, Purah. You've been awake for over thirty-six hours, and that certainly—”

“I promise I will after I finish speaking with the heroes. Sleep can wait, this cannot.”

Their eyes remained locked together for another moment before Symin sighed and said, “I’ll be at Rhodes’s home. But I won’t sleep until you do.”

“Deal.” Symin nodded and started toward town. He paused for a moment beside Wild and opened his mouth, but no words came forth. Finally, he simply nodded and walked away.

Purah turned to Wild. “Have a seat. I need to retrieve something from my bunker.”

Before he could respond, she walked into the ruins of her home. She followed the path she and Symin had cleared through the litter when they’d first emerged from the bunker. At the other end of this path was a stone stairwell that descended into the depths of the hill. The bookshelf that had helped conceal this staircase did not survive the destruction of the lab. Neither did the books, the papers, nor the documents it had held. Nor did _any_ of the books, the papers, or the documents. Over a hundred years of work, of diligent study and experimentation, of recording facts and findings, over a century of her life’s work was all just gone.

Gone.

All of the effort she’d poured her heart into for years, and years, and years had been erased in the time it took for her heart to complete a single beat.

Just gone.

Purah pushed the thoughts aside and took the stairs down. The stone and metal walls were untouched, with only the scent of burnt wood and ionized air providing any hint as to the destruction above. In the square room of the bunker, lit by good, old-fashioned oil lanterns, she crossed to one of the lockers standing against the wall and opened it. From within, she pulled out a small chest, which she placed on the seat of a nearby chair. She opened the lid, examined its contents, and gave a small nod.

When she emerged from the ruins of the lab with the chest under an arm, she found Wild, Hyrule, Sky, Four, Wind, and Twilight all seated on the ground in a loose half-circle, with plenty of openings for the others to take when they arrived. Four and Hyrule were quietly discussing something, she couldn’t hear what, while the others sat in silence. Wild’s gaze was fixed on the twisted, broken metal wreckage in his hands. Purah came to stand before them and set the chest on the ground before her feet.

“Any word on the others?” she asked.

“They were standing in the pasture when we passed by,” Twilight answered, “seemed like they were talking about something. They should be here soon.”

Purah nodded and looked about the gathering of heroes from all throughout Hyrule’s history. She still couldn’t believe that she’d met them all, and she didn’t know if she ever would. Her gaze came to a stop on Wind, whose eyes were downcast and lips pulled down into a frown.

“Hero of Winds.” His eyes snapped to her immediately, and the curiosity on his face was as plain as daylight. “Last time you all were here, did I remember to tell you that the stories about you were always my favorite?”

A wide, bashful smile lit up his face like a lantern. “Yes.”

“Good.” She returned a smile of her own. “That means I’ll probably remember to tell you next time, too.”

Wind’s smile brightened even more, if that were possible. Sky reached over and ruffled the sailor’s hair before Wind swatted him away with a laugh. Whatever they said to each other never reached Purah’s ears, though, for her gaze was pulled to the path, where Time, Legend, and Warriors were now approaching. The former’s face seemed neutral, perhaps a bit more alert than when she’d parted ways with him. But there was no mistaking the looks in the eyes of the other two.

They were hunters’ eyes.

Purah quietly sighed at the thought of how this conversation was going to go. The three new arrivals took their seats, and a conversation of glances passed among the group as a whole before Purah spoke up.

“Thank you all, for your help. And thank you for coming. We obviously need to discuss the matter of the monster and why it came here, and so first, I need to ask: do you have a name for this creature?”

The heroes were silent for a moment before Legend spoke up first, his eyes hard and his mouth locked in a scowl. “A name?”

“Yes. The first step to addressing a problem is to apply a label to it to ensure clear communication. I want to know if you all have already taken that step.”

After another moment of silence, Legend spoke again, his voice noticeably louder. “No, actually, we haven’t taken that step yet, we were planning to address that matter at our _next_ team meeting.”

“Veteran,” Time said with a warning edge in his voice. If the veteran heard the warning, he chose not to heed it, his temper rising still.

“But now seems as good a time as any! Why don’t we call it, I don’t know, _Gigantis_ or something, huh? That’ll _definitely_ help us figure out how to stop it!”

_“Veteran.”_

“Leviathan,” Wild said, stopping the conversation in its tracks. When all eyes turned to him, he said, “During my quest, I met these researchers looking for fossils of creatures they called ‘leviathans.’ I found the fossils, and they were…massive. They’re the only things I’ve seen that’re in the same league as this monster.”

Purah nodded. “Very well, then. The Leviathan. Now, some of you have already explained its behavior to me. From what I’ve been told, it seems almost certain that the Leviathan came here with the specific intention of destroying my lab. The rest of the damage it caused seems to have been…collateral, in nature. That begs the question of _why_ it targeted my lab, and for that, I have a hypothesis.”

She opened the chest at her feet and lifted from it a large, smooth rock that looked as if it were made of blue glass that she presented for them all to see. Most of the heroes furrowed their brows at the sight, but Wild recognized it immediately.

“Coral?” he asked.

“From Zora’s Domain.” She stared at the chunk of coral in her hands for a moment before returning it to the chest. “I need to provide context for my hypothesis. You’re all aware of our intentions to rebuild Hyrule’s infrastructure, the castle, its towns. Well, our most optimistic calculations of the labor and resources necessary to complete that effort gave us an estimate of approximately one hundred and twenty to one hundred and fifty years. 

“After your last visit here, we began preparing for the first steps to organizing the reconstruction efforts. Then, Princess Zelda found a new aspect of her inner power: the ability to access knowledge that no mortal can attain. She cannot use this ability frequently, and it takes its toll on her, but with it, she learned of stores and archives of lost, ancient technology, and records of information. In these stores, we found construction machines. With their usage, we predict that we could complete the restoration of Hyrule in as few as eighty years.”

Legend opened his mouth, but Warrior’s hand latched onto his shoulder before he could say a word. He turned to face the captain and was met with a look in his friend’s eye that gave him pause. Swallowing his words, he turned his attention back to the scientist, who continued her explanation.

“Then, in one of the later archives we found, we discovered records of a process that would reduce the estimates even further. By constructing and using a particular type of machine, we could channel the magic that fuels Sheikah technology through the coral found in Zora’s Domain and _amplify_ it _exponentially._ With this process, we could increase the efficiency of the construction machines to such a degree as to finish the restoration of Hyrule in _twenty years.”_

She let the magnitude of that statement hang in the air for a moment before looking down to the chest at her feet. “I set to work at once on conducting experiments with coral samples and prototypes of the amplification machinery.” She lifted her head and looked to each of the heroes. “I have conducted experiments with ancient technology in this laboratory for over a century, and not once has a giant monster ever come stomping into town to blow my home to smithereens. But after seven months of experimenting on this process and generating these amplified levels of power, now my home is in ruins, this village has been destroyed, and innocent people have—”

A shuddering gasp cut her words off and her mouth slammed closed. She pulled her glasses off with one hand and covered her eyes with the other before taking a deep breath in, then slowly letting it out. When she found her footing again, she returned her glasses to their place and looked back to the heroes.

“The odds of that being a coincidence are miniscule.”

Wild frowned and asked, “Has Robbie been doing experiments, too? In Akkala?”

“Yes. But not for several weeks. He’d finished his work much sooner than me. He finalized the working model of the amplifying machine, and he and the princess have been assembling it in Zora’s Domain.”

Wild’s eyes widened and his heart dropped into his stomach. _“What?”_

Purah nodded. “The quantity of coral in the Domain’s superstructure, as well as its shape, made it both ideal and necessary for our plan. The machine installed there would use the sculpture’s entire mass to amplify the copious amount of magic that we need, then utilize the superstructure’s form as a kind of antennae to…‘broadcast’ the amplified power out to the construction machines across the kingdom. And if my hypothesis is correct, if the Leviathan is drawn to this amplified power, then it’s on its way there right now.”

The invisible band around Wild’s chest returned with a cobra’s vengeance. He leapt to his feet and said to the others, “We have to go _now.”_

 _“Wait,”_ Time said, holding up his hand. He turned to Purah and said, “And what if your hypothesis is wrong?”

“You must go to the Domain anyways,” she answered. “Zelda may be able to tap into her power and learn about the Leviathan. Where it’s going, what it’s after. Whether I’m right or wrong, she might be able to point you in the right direction.”

Time nodded and stood. “All right then. Zora’s Domain it is.”

“Let’s go get our gear, boys,” Warriors said as the other heroes all stood. Wild started towards the path at a brisk pace, until his mind caught up with his heart. He stopped and looked back, his comrades passing him by, and saw Purah still standing in place, her eyes cast down to the open chest before her. After a moment, Wild slowly walked back to stand beside her.

“Are you okay?” he asked.

At first, she gave no sign that she’d even heard him. Finally, she reached down into the chest and stood with the coral in hand. She held it up before her eyes and turned it around, examining every inch of it as though it were fine jewelry.

“No,” she finally answered before she dropped the coral to the dirt. “Not right now, I’m not.”


	6. Magnitude

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I actually don't think this chapter needs any content warnings? If you disagree, please let me know and offer a suggestion.

The threads of blue light that descended onto the teleportation pad of the Ne’ez Yohma Shrine coalesced into the shapes of Wild, Time, and Twilight. The old man and the rancher looked about the chamber they now found themselves in and took note of the expertly carved, coral walls around them. A staircase before them led up to an open doorway, and water flowed down its steps to pool around the shrine, turning it into an island. The stream's trickling music would normally echo around the chamber, but a new sound overshadowed its tune—a new sound unnervingly out of place in the champion's time.

The sound of large crowds.

Wild darted forward, wading through the water and ascending the staircase with a purpose. Time and Twilight followed, their feet splashing up the steps until they came to a stop on either side of the champion. From their place in the entryway, the three heroes looked out onto a large plaza filled to bursting with people—zora, Hylians, gorons, rito, _and_ gerudo. Crowds and groups flowed all around the plaza like streams: up and down one staircase, up and down the other, and revolving around the base of the statue that stood at the plaza’s center. Banners and strings of lights dressed railings and pillars all about, and the air hummed with voices, laughter, and music.

The heroes all frowned at the sight, and all of the color drained from Wild’s face.

“Are there usually this many people here, Champion?” Twilight quietly asked, his brows furrowed.

“No. I’ve _never_ seen this many people in one place in my time.”

Time’s eye stayed on the crowds before him as he said, “Go get the others, Champion. We don’t know how much time we have.” Wild finally tore his gaze away from the plaza to look down at his slate. After a few taps of the screen, he disappeared and left his companions where they stood. An uneasy silence hung between the two of them before Twilight finally spoke up.

“We have to get these people out of here.”

“We will,” Time said. “But first, we need to speak to the princess and find out if Purah’s hypothesis is even correct. If it is, the princess can have the zora’s ruler order an evacuation. It’ll be much easier to get everyone out if the local authorities are helping.” They were quiet again until the sounds of legs sloshing through the water behind them reached their ears. Warriors and Wind came to a stop beside them, and the captain visibly started at the sight before him.

“Oh _shit,”_ he said.

Twilight nodded. “Yeah.”

Wind frowned, his eyes wide. “We’ve got to get these people out of here!”

“After we speak to the princess,” Time replied. “The zora’s ruler can order the guards to help us.” A short time later, the sounds of sloshing water brought Legend and Hyrule to the group. The veteran’s jaw went slack at what he saw.

“Oh _shit,”_ he said.

Warriors let out a hard sigh from his nose. “Yeah.”

“It looks like a festival or something,” Hyrule said, pointing to the decorations and tracing along them with his finger.

Now it was Time who let out a sigh, his much quieter and wearier. Another few minutes later, the sounds of splashing footsteps brought Sky, Four, and Wild to the group. The champion pushed past Warriors and stood before his comrades.

“Stick close,” he said, “I’ll take us to the throne room.” He turned and pressed forward into the crossing currents of people. Voices and bodies alike pressed into him as he weaved his way past people of all races. After dodging around a trio of gorons, Wild found himself walking past the statue at the plaza’s center. He couldn’t help but come to a stop before it and look up at the coral likeness of his dearest friend.

She towered over him. She towered over the whole plaza and looked down upon it with the gentle grace she’d always exuded. That she’d always exuded in his few memories, at least. Her trident rested on her shoulder, its pointed head lowered to the base on which she stood. Her hands rested on the shaft in a relaxed grip that could spring to action in a moment’s notice. The look on her face, timeless and kind, promised anyone under her gaze that she would care for them.

_Link follows the spray of water upwards with his eyes, his grip tightening on his weapons. He finds Mipha, and the world seems to slow to a crawl. Sunlight ripples off of water droplets, surrounding her in a hundred twinkling starlets. She seems to hover, held in place among the stars, and for a moment, he almost forgets to breathe. He just barely catches the sight of her smile before she dives toward him with her trident raised—_

Wild blinked with a sharp breath and pulled his eyes away from the statue. He took another, softer breath before Twilight, beside him, said, “Champion?”

“Sorry,” he answered before looking back up to the statue again. “I….”

_The peerless silver and ruby head of Mipha’s trident lays broken and twisted, half-buried under the rubble of another home he couldn’t protect._

“I lost myself for a second.”

But he knew exactly where he was. He knew exactly what was so important about where he was. And he _would_ protect this place. He would stop that _thing_ from laying a single claw on her home.

He _had_ to.

“Link?” a familiar, resonant voice called out over the sounds of the crowd, firmly pulling Wild’s attention back to the present. He turned around and was greeted with the sight of a towering, red zora in royal finery approaching him. _“Link,_ my dearest friend!!”

Wild barely had time to take a breath before he was swept up into a crushing hug by Prince Sidon. He could only croak and grunt as the zora squeezed his arms into his ribs—and all of the air out of his chest. The other heroes watched the scene unfolding before them with varying expressions of concern and amusement.

“Oh, it’s _such_ a pleasure to see you!” Sidon cried before setting the Hylian Champion down. “I had no idea you’d be coming today. And are these…” Sidon leaned in and dropped his voice to a whisper, “the other heroes the princess spoke of?”

Wild took a moment to catch his breath. “She told you about them?”

Sidon nodded. “Only those of us who know that you’re the hero, of course. And speaking of the princess, you all absolutely _must_ see her!”

Time interjected before Wild could respond. “Indeed. We need to speak with her and the ruler of the zora immediately. It’s very urgent.”

“Well then, you’re in luck,” Sidon said before striking his signature pose. “I am Sidon, Prince of the Zora! And I can take you all to my father, King Dorephan, immediately. Follow me!”

Without another word, Sidon placed a hand on Wild’s back and pushed him along to walk beside him. The other heroes followed along behind them, forming an entourage for the zora prince. The crowd parted to make way for them as they strolled towards the stairway to the upper levels.

“Sidon,” Wild said, his eyes roving over the faces of the people making way for him, “why are all of these people here?”

“Oh the princess has such _marvelous_ news! She’s holding a festival here to share it with the people of Hyrule, and it’s just…so… _ooooo,_ I simply can’t _wait_ for you to hear it! I’d tell you myself, but I’m certain that Princess Zelda will want to tell you herself, and I’d bet she’d be _thrilled_ to share it with your compatriots as well. And speaking of…I simply must ask, is it true you all share the same name?”

“Yes,” Wild replied.

 _“Interesting._ And how do you all distinguish between each other?”

“Nicknames.”

“Nicknames! Oh how _fun!_ And what is yours?”

Despite the pressure around his chest, Wild couldn’t help but smile. Around Sidon, _no one_ could. “They usually call me ‘Champion’ or ‘Cook.’”

“Hmm, yes, both very fitting.” As they neared the staircase to the throne room, Sidon looked to his left, where Time walked with a small smile of his own on his face. “And you, good sir, what do they call you?”

Time couldn’t help the good-humored huff from his nose. “They call me ‘Old Man.’”

Sidon stopped and turned to face him head on, bringing the group to a halt as well. “‘Old Man?’ I’m certainly no expert on Hylian physiology, but you don’t strike me as old at all!”

From his place one step behind Legend, Twilight snorted before opening his waterskin and lifting it to his mouth. Time’s smile faded a touch before he said, “It’s an ironic nickname.”

“Well, it’s not very befitting one of the great heroes of legend! You must have a proper title, don’t you?”

The old man’s smile flattened even more. “You may call me the Hero of Time, if you prefer.”

Sidon’s eyes widened. “The Hero of Time? _You’re_ the one who was engaged to marry Ruto, the zora sage!!”

The sudden sounds of water being violently spewed from someone’s mouth and a loud squawk drew everyone’s eyes to Twilight and Legend. The rancher held one hand clamped over his mouth, his eyes as wide as dinner plates. Directly before him, the veteran stood with the back of his hat, neck, and shoulders completely drenched. He slowly turned around and glared daggers, swords, and spears into Twilight’s soul.

 _“Really?!”_ he barked through his teeth.

Everyone stared at the scene for another moment before Time cleared his throat and turned back to Sidon. “Yes, well, uh…that was a— a misunderstanding, um….”

“A misunderstanding? Then, she _didn’t_ gift you the Spiritual Stone of Water?”

“No, she, uh— she did, but, uh—”

“Then you two were engaged to be married. The rules are quite clear, I don’t see how there could be any misunderst—”

A young woman’s voice, coated with a regal accent, cut through the prince’s words and said, “Link?”

They all turned to the top of the staircase, where Princess Zelda stood. She, the heroes, and Sidon were all quiet for a moment, waiting for someone to say something. Finally, Zelda trekked down the stairway to stand before Wild and offer him a smile. “It’s so good to see you again.”

He blinked a couple of times. “You cut your hair.”

She didn’t have a response to that, and everyone was left standing in silence again until she cleared her throat. “Um, yes, I did. Thank you for…noticing…. And it’s wonderful to see the rest of you, too! I have so much news to share with you all.”

“I’m afraid that’s why we’re here, Your Majesty,” Time said. “We need to speak with you and the zora king both immediately. This place and everyone in it is in grave danger.”

* * *

The sounds of revelry and music that drifted into the throne room overlooking Zora’s Domain sounded faded and distant, as if they were passing through a wall of fog, a barrier to another world. Inside the throne room, no one made a sound and the air hung thick with the solemnity of a tomb.

Zora royal guards stood at their posts, discreetly exchanging glances. Seven of the Heroes of Courage sat in the rows of seats that lined the room. The massive King Dorephan towered over the entire room in his perched throne, his mouth pulled into a frown. To his left stood his son; to his right, the scientists Robbie and Jerrin—and on the raised platform before his royal seat stood Zelda, Wild, and Time.

Zelda blinked and swallowed, processing everything she’d just heard. The action sounded raucous to her ears. She opened her mouth, but no words came forth. She tried again and finally whispered to her friend, “I am… _so_ sorry for what you have lost, Link.”

_The peerless silver and ruby head of Mipha’s trident lays broken and twisted, half-buried under the rubble of another home he couldn’t protect._

Wild felt the band around his chest squeeze. “Can it work?” he asked.

Zelda blinked. “What?”

“Purah’s idea. Can you really use your power to figure out what this thing is? If it’s coming here?”

“Well…theoretically, yes,” she answered after some thought. “Given its size, it would probably be quite easy to find.”

“‘To find?’” Time asked. She nodded.

“When I tap into that… _aspect_ of my power, I feel as if…as if I’m floating over all of Hyrule. Over all of the living world. And when I reach out for something, it’s as if I…feel where it is, feel it pulling me toward it, and then I… _fly_ to it? Fly _into_ it?” The princess shook her head. “I don’t really know how to describe it, it’s…too….” 

She settled for a vague gesture with her hand. Time nodded and asked, “Are there any preparations we need to make? Or anything we can do to help?”

“No. No, I just…have to do it.” Zelda looked down for a moment and nodded to herself. She stepped forward into the center of the platform, took a deep breath in, and closed her eyes. She stood as still as a statue.

And then the air _changed._

No living mortal could ever explain it. There was no change in what they could see or hear. But everyone in the throne room _felt_ it. They felt it in their skin, in their bones, even in their teeth. It wasn’t an unpleasant change. It was not painful. It was….

_Charged._

Wild and Time’s gazes met, and they each saw that the other felt it, too. The champion looked back to Zelda’s face and found her eyes moving behind their lids, as if she were dreaming. They flicked to and fro, never settling in one position. He watched her dream for seconds that felt like minutes before she let out the first whimper. It was so faint that he almost thought he’d imagined it. But then another sprouted forth. Her face scrunched into the faintest grimace. A louder whimper rang out and her chin lowered toward her chest.

Wild raised his hand towards her shoulder but stopped short of touching her. He looked over to Time for answers, for guidance, but the old man only returned a look as lost as his. Another, louder, whimper brought his eyes back to the princess, who now had tears welling in her eyelashes. Her frown quivered and a low whine began to ring from her throat. He finally stepped forward and placed a hand on her arm.

“Zelda?”

As if in answer, her whine grew louder and more shrill, bursting out from her parted lips like steam from underneath a kettle. When he saw the first tears roll down her cheeks, he gently shook her.

“Zelda?!”

The whine broke into sharp whimpers and she choked out a sob, her tears pouring down her face in rivers. He shook her again, harder.

_“Zelda?!”_

The princess’s eyes flew open with a wail, and her legs buckled under her. Wild and Time lunged forward and barely caught her in their arms. She buried her face into the champion’s chest, her screams and gasps muffled by his tunic. She sobbed and wailed as if she’d broken a limb, as if she’d killed a harmless animal, as if her heart had been broken with relish. 

“Whoa, easy, easy!” Wild soothed as he and Time helped ease her down to sit on the floor. He stayed kneeling beside her while she bled anguish all over him. He rubbed her shoulders and whispered to her until she calmed down enough to let him pull away from her. He unscrewed the cap from his waterskin and pushed it towards her, only for her to swat it out of his hands. It landed on the floor and spilled its reserve as Zelda clutched her head in her hands and choked and hiccupped.

He stared at her for a moment before he carefully put a hand on her shoulder. As soon as he touched her, she latched onto his forearm with both hands as if she were hanging over a cliff’s edge. She looked into his eyes and forced her words out, her voice strained and wet.

“It’s in _pain,”_ she said, “it’s in _so much pain.”_

Wild’s heart leapt into his throat at what he saw in her eyes.

“I saw a memory,” she sobbed. “I saw a light brighter than the light of Hylia and more _awful_ than Malice itself. The light _burned_ its skin, and its eyes, and its throat, and they _still burn, they’ve never stopped,_ and…it— it doesn’t know where it is. This is not its home, its _world,_ and it doesn’t know why it’s here, but it feels…it feels the power we’re generating. And it doesn’t feel _the same_ as that awful light, but it feels _just similar enough_ that it’s not taking _any_ chances and it’s…it’s coming here to snuff that energy out, and—”

Zelda stopped. Her brows furrowed and her mouth constricted into a thin line. Her eyes hardened through tears before she started to push herself up to her feet. Wild and Time reached out to help her, but she pushed their hands away. Instead, they rose with her, slowly, the champion’s hands held out and ready to catch her if she faltered. She wavered and stilled herself, but when she was certain of herself again, she pulled herself to her full height and turned to Robbie and Jerrin. She spoke with a sharp edge to her voice that Wild had never heard before.

“I want that machine dismantled and all of our blueprints for it destroyed, Robbie. Right now.”

The Sheikah scientist started. “But, Your Majesty! Our projected timetables without the mach—”

 _“Now,_ Robbie.” As she spoke, Wild realized that there was more than an edge—her voice was coated in _venom._ “It may take us longer to rebuild without it, but Leviathan or no, if the energy that machine creates even _remotely_ resembles what I saw, I want it _nowhere_ near my people, _do you understand me?”_

Robbie’s mouth fluttered, like a goldfish gasping for air, before it finally closed as he nodded. “Yes, Your Majesty. But, I’m afraid that won’t solve the immediate problem.”

Zelda closed her eyes and took a deep breath before opening them again. The venom was gone, leaving behind unmistakeable weariness. “What do you mean?”

“Well, um…the act of channeling the Sheikah magic that powers our technology into the zora coral is like, uhhhhh, placing steel into a forge. Once the magic is sufficiently channeled through the coral, it becomes powerful enough to increase the efficiency of the technology. Likewise, when you sufficiently heat steel in a forge, it becomes malleable enough to fold and sharpen into a blade. But, if you remove the steel from the forge without smithing it at all, it’s still dangerously hot until it has time to cool. Likewise, once you remove the Sheikah magic from the coral, the coral is still retaining and channeling some residual magic, leaving it, uh, ‘hot,’ in a manner of speaking.”

“Meaning that when your machine is deactivated,” Four said from his place at the edge of the room, “the coral here will still be hot enough to attract the Leviathan.”

Robbie nodded. “Yes, precisely.”

“How long will the coral be ‘hot’ after the machine is deactivated, Robbie?” Zelda asked.

“Uh, let’s see….” He lowered his chin, the eyes on his goggles swirling about independently of each other. “Hmm…anywhere from thirty-six to fifty-three hours.”

Heroes and guards alike exchanged glances around the room. Warriors finally rose from his seat and strode toward the raised platform, stopping just shy of its edge. “King Dorephan. The Leviathan cannot be stopped by mere infantry units. Your warriors will best be used ensuring as quick and orderly an exodus from Zora’s Domain as we can manage. The beast began making its way here almost a day ago, and we have no way of knowing how much time we have left before it arrives. We need to begin evacuating the Domain immediately.”

Dorephan’s frown deepened. Beside him, Sidon lowered his head in thought. The king finally asked, “Is there truly nothing we can do?”

Warriors paused for only a moment. “We still don’t know.”

“What about the blue arrows?” Wind asked. Several eyes turned toward him.

“What?” Warriors said.

“The cook’s arrows, the glowy blue ones. They can stop the guardians, maybe they can stop the Leviathan!”

Wild and Warriors exchanged glances before the champion crossed to stand before Robbie. He reached into his adventuring pouch and withdrew two smaller pouches. “Can you teleport to your lab and bring back as many ancient arrows as you can make from these parts?”

Robbie took the pouches in hand and the eyes on his goggles swirled about. Finally, he looked up to Wild and asked, “How many rupees do you have?”

“Now is _not_ the time, Robbie,” Zelda growled.

“Uhhh, _right!_ Yes, of course, I can.”

“Our party will handle trying to stop the Leviathan,” Time said to King Dorephan. “Your forces should still remain focused on evacuating the people here.”

The zora king nodded, then stood from his seat. “I shall oversee the evacuation myself. Captain Bazz, you and your personnel shall follow me.”

“Yes, Your Majesty,” Bazz replied with a salute. He and the other zora guards fell into formation around the king.

“Come, Sidon, we must tend to our duties,” Dorephan said as he crossed toward the entryway. He was stopped short of the stairway by his son's voice.

“Wait," Sidon said before he marched, instead, toward the Princess of Hyrule. “Your Majesty, if the Leviathan arrives before the evacuation is complete, then measures must be taken to buy time.” Once he was standing before her, he knelt down on one knee. “Princess Zelda, one hundred years ago, you saw me promise my sister that if anything were to happen to her, I would protect our home in her stead. To fulfill that promise, I request to be named as the new Champion of the Zora, so that I may pilot the Divine Beast Vah Ruta to fight this wretched beast.”

Jerrin gasped and Robbie choked. Dorephan’s mouth fell open. Wild’s eyes widened. And Sidon kept his gaze fixed on Zelda’s.

“Um, I don’t know if that’s possible, Your Majesty,” Robbie said. “Princess Mipha was, uh, _uniquely qualified_ to pilot a Divine Beast, it was willing to accept her—”

“And _I_ am uniquely qualified because she left that duty to me,” Sidon said without looking away from Zelda. “Vah Ruta will accept me. I know it.”

Zelda returned his gaze for a long while. “Even if you aren’t qualified…it will accept you if you have the right co-pilot.” Her eyes drifted to the Hylian Champion, followed shortly by Sidon’s. When Wild realized they were both looking at him, he met Sidon’s eyes and strode forward to stand before him.

“If you’ll have me,” he said, his hand held out.

Sidon smiled, stood, and grasped Link’s forearm. “It will be an _honor.”_

Zelda squared her shoulders and turned to the Sheikah scientist standing beside Dorephan’s throne. “Robbie, you’ll take mine and Link’s Sheikah Slates to your lab and authenticate them to initialize Vah Medoh and Vah Ruta. Then, you’ll bring them back with all of the ancient arrows you can carry, so that the other heroes may be able to strike against the Leviathan.” Holding her slate out towards an approaching Robbie, she turned to Wild and Sidon. “While you familiarize yourselves with Vah Ruta, I will go to Rito Village and ask Teba to join me in co-piloting Vah Medoh. We will make our way here with all speed to try and force a two-on-one encounter.”

Now by their side, Robbie took Zelda’s Sheikah Slate before holding an open hand out towards Wild. The champion blinked and paused for a long second before taking his own slate from its place on his belt and handing it over.

He suddenly felt rather naked.

“We don’t know how much time we have before that _thing_ gets here,” he said to Zelda, practically spitting the word. “Do you think Vah Medoh can beat it here?”

Zelda flinched at his disdain, but pushed it aside. “I don’t know. But if there’s even the smallest chance, then we have to take it.” She turned to Time and said, “I’ll leave you and your companions to devise your own plan." He nodded, but anything he might’ve said was cut off by the voice of King Dorephan.

“Sidon.” All eyes turned to the zora king, who locked gazes with his son. “You can’t do this.”

The prince’s brows furrowed as he stepped towards the king. “I can, Father, and I _must.”_

“You _can’t!”_ Dorephan barked, his eyes wild. He gathered himself back together and said, “I— I forbid you!”

 _“Father._ I swore a vow to her. You cannot stop me.” Sidon marched toward the king as he said, “We each have our duties, Father. I must carry out mine as you must carry out yours. And _together,_ we will ensure our people’s safety.”

Dorephan’s mouth hung open, a thousand words and commands and pleas whirling in his eyes. Finally, his mouth slowly drew closed and he gave a weak nod. “Very well,” he breathed. “Then let us protect them.”

For someone so large, he suddenly seemed so incredibly frail.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here's some fun trivia for you: in the week between posting chapters 2 and 3, I discovered an LU fic called _Moon's Tears_ by wyrmwood (archangelgf). Not only is it a fantastically written story in its own right and you should absolutely check it out, but it beat me to publishing the "You cut your hair" gag by at least a few weeks lol.


	7. Contingency Planning

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once again, I don't think this chapter actually needs any content warnings. Once again, please inform m

The music and laughter in Zora’s Domain was gone. Instead, the air hung heavy with troubled muttering and shuffling steps. There was no headcount of all the people in Zora’s Domain, but Sidon had said that, based on the words of the guards, there was something between three and five hundred souls present. Now, they were all being shepherded off of the superstructure and herded toward the only suitably developed environment to house so many people: the East Reservoir Lake. A long crowd of Hylians, gerudo, gorons, and zora trailed from the Domain’s central mezzanine, over the eastern bridge, to the staircase leading up the face of the reservoir’s dam. The uncertain evacuees followed the path, ushered along by a chain of zora guards and volunteers from the ranks of the festival attendees.

It was a slow process by necessity, for the sake of everyone’s safety. As a result, countless people were crowded in groups on the various levels of the Domain, all waiting for their turn to cross the bridge. In the meantime, all they could do was talk. Trepidation coated their words and hovered about them all like a mist, palpable even in the throne room. There, Zelda, Sidon, and the Heroes of Courage—save for Wild—encircled a table, upon which the princess unrolled a large, paper map. After they pinned the map’s corners down with empty bottles, Zelda swiped her hand over the full image.

“The Leviathan will be trying to take the lowest route to its destination that it can find,” she said before pointing to a labeled body of water. “That means that it will surely approach from the Lanayru Wetlands and try to cross through the Tabahl Woods. The Wetlands are open and shallow enough that Vah Ruta can easily engage it there.”

“It won’t even reach the Inogo Bridge,” Sidon answered.

“We can’t make that assumption,” Warriors said before leaning down to give the map a closer look. “We have to be prepared for the worst-case scenario. So if it isn’t stopped at the Wetlands, it’ll have to try and make its way through here?” He pointed to the final bend in Zora River—the jagged, narrow canyon between Orlen’s Bridge and Luto’s Crossing.

“Yes,” Zelda said with a nod.

Hyrule leaned in for a closer look of his own, his brows furrowed. “Can...can it even fit through there?” he asked. When he received no reply, he looked to the princess to find her eyes darkened and her mouth pulled into a frown.

“...It will,” she finally said. “It’ll widen the canyon, if it has to.”

The heroes exchanged glances at the thought before Warriors retook the floor.

“Then that’s where we’ll be waiting for it,” he said with a nod before standing upright. “We’ll be firing these ‘ancient’ arrows, but the Leviathan’s hide has so far proven to be impenetrable. We should be thinking of ways to score direct hits on its eyes or into its mouth, like a gohma or a king dodongo.”

“How deep is the river there?” Twilight asked.

“Twenty-five meters or so,” Sidon said. “Ruto Lake, here at the base of the falls, goes as deep as forty.”

“That’d reduce the height advantage,” Wild said, drawing all eyes to him as he approached the table. “Shame it’s not gonna get that far.” Gone were his champion’s tunic, traveling trousers, leather boots, and black cloak. Now, he stood before them dressed from his neck to his feet in the blue and silver raiment of handmade zora armor. He looked up to the zora prince beside him with a fierce gaze and said, “Right?”

Sidon took in the sight of his friend before he smiled and held out his hand. “Right.” Wild took hold of his friend’s forearm and squeezed for approximately four seconds before he was scooped up into another, bone-crushing hug. “You look magnificent,” Sidon whispered to him. “Brother.”

After a moment, Wild finally managed to wheeze out, “Thanks.”

“Aha, I _knew_ there was a knight somewhere under that mess of hair,” Warriors said with a smile as Sidon put Wild back down. “Now all we’re missing is the little old man with the arrows so you can show us how—”

“I’m here!” came the sharp reply from behind Wild. Robbie walked up to the table and lifted a leather satchel onto it. Reaching in, he first extracted two Sheikah Slates and offered them to Wild and Zelda. The champion took his with a smile—he could _feel_ the hole in his chest fill in—and immediately started looking through its inventory to ensure everything was where he’d left it. “And here are…” Robbie began withdrawing bundles of ancient arrows and setting them out on the table, “one hundred and ten ancient arrows.”

Warriors frowned. “That doesn’t divide evenly among seven. Someone’s going to have to be short-changed.”

“Seven?” Wild asked.

“The captain will be assisting with the evacuation,” Time said. “The royal guard needs as much help as it can get, and he has the experience they need.”

“The rest of them, however, need to know how to use one of these,” Warriors said as he picked up an ancient arrow and held it out nock-first toward Wild. “Care to demonstrate?”

Wild took the arrow and pointed the Sheikah device that housed the blade toward the ceiling. Pointing to a small ring aperture with a finger, he said, “This is the trigger mechanism. You draw the arrow back on your bowstring, then use a finger on your bow-hand to pull it, like this.” He pulled the trigger with his index finger, causing the blade to spring to life in a flash of blue light and a deep hum. With another trigger pull, the blade retracted and vanished as quickly as it’d appeared. He then drew his bow with his left hand, nocked the arrows, and demonstrated activating and deactivating the blade with the bowstring drawn. 

“How severely do you have to compensate for the weight?” Twilight asked, pointing towards the blade device.

“You don’t.”

“You _what?”_ Legend balked.

“You don’t. I don’t know how, but when the blade’s active, it makes the whole contraption weigh about as much as a typical arrowhead. I asked Purah about it once, but I couldn’t understand anything she said. Now you all try it, see for yourselves.”

They each took an arrow from the table and set about practicing. The majority of them took to it simply enough, the throne room flashing with blue lights popping and winking in and out of existence like little firecrackers. But there were two exceptions who encountered a very big problem—Wind and Four’s arms and bowstrings were simply too short. Even at full draw, half of the arrow’s shaft separated their bow-hands from the trigger mechanism.

“Well,” Warriors said with a frown, “it looks like you two will be helping me with the evacuation.”

“Aw, _come on!”_ Wind groused. “We evacuated people in the cook’s village! Can’t the smith and I just stick the ancient doo-hickeys on our arrows?”

“No,” Robbie said. “They have to be calibrated to the length and weight of the arrows they’re attached to. I’d have to go back to my lab and make the adjustments there.”

“And we’ve lost enough time to waiting for him,” Warriors added. “I’m sorry, Sailor, but we have to play with the cards we’re dealt. Besides, I’ve got a special mission in mind that I’d really rather have a hero in charge of, and one of you would be perfect for the job.”

“On the note of time,” Zelda said, “Link, Sidon, and I should go. I need to reach Vah Medoh as soon as possible.”

Time nodded. “Go on, Your Majesty.”

Wild grabbed a bundle of arrows from the table. “I’m gonna take ten of these,” he said as he placed what he needed in his quiver and returned the rest, “just in case. I’ll come back to warn you when we see it coming.”

“Hylia walk with you all,” Sky wished with a smile.

“And you, as well!” Sidon responded in kind as Wild began tapping on his Sheikah Slate. Within seconds, they unraveled and drifted away.

* * *

When the blue light cleared from his vision, Wild found himself standing on Vah Ruta’s teleportation pad for the first time in over a year. He blinked and took in the sight before him. From Vah Ruta’s perch atop the highest peak in the Zodobon Highlands, he could see what seemed like the entirety of the southern reaches of Hyrule. Mount Lanayru rose into the sky, the hills of Necluda rolled into the horizon, and the green sea of Hyrule Field napped in the distance. The first shades of pink and orange peeked through the blue curtains of the sky. A small gasp to his side brought his gaze to Sidon, whose eyes were nearly the size of shields.

“This is _marvelous,”_ the prince whispered. Wild looked back out onto the rolling fields and nodded. 

“Yeah. It is.” The invisible band around his chest pulsed, as if to remind him of its presence. He allowed himself just one more moment to take in the view before he turned and started making his way toward the Divine Beast’s interior. “Come on, let’s get this thing started.”

At his first step through the door, he was smothered with a feeling of malaise. It was as if his heart was wearing its boots on the wrong feet. As if it had its shirt on backward. He strained his ears, smelled the air, and searched for the sickly taste in the air he breathed. All of his senses told him nothing, and only then did he realize that he was searching for any signs of Malice. With a sigh and a small shake of his head, he admonished himself for being so on edge. He’d conquered this beast almost a year ago. Casting the thought aside, he made his way down to the main control unit with Zelda and Sidon in tow. The sounds of their footsteps echoed around the large hall as they approached the central terminal.

“Your Sheikah Slate should be authenticated to activate Vah Ruta,” Zelda said as they came to a stop before the MCU. “Simply place it on the terminal, as you did when you purged the Blight.” Wild took his slate from his belt and looked at it for a moment before placing it face-down on the terminal’s surface. The device gave its signature chime, and a round, translucent plate of blue, hard light covered in Sheikah runes appeared, hovering over the terminal. “Now, Sidon, place your hand on the ring.”

The zora prince took a breath, steeled himself, and splayed his hand flat onto the hard light plate. Layers of the ring rotated around the appendage, lights glowing and dimming on the terminal. They all simultaneously pulsed once and the device gave a chime. Sheikah runes spelled out a message that neither Wild nor Sidon could read before rapidly changing. The champion and the prince both raised their eyebrows at the new zora runes that welcomed Sidon as the new pilot of Vah Ruta.

“Very good,” Zelda said with a nod. “Now, follow the initiation instructions.”

The prince nodded and began cautiously pressing runes on the display before him. A sudden sound behind the trio made them all turn to find a floating chair made of the same glowing, blue light as the terminal display. Sidon eyed the seat before rising to his full height and walking towards it. He turned and settled into it, examining the glowing runes that covered the chair’s arms. He tapped a few keys on the display before a cuirass of blue, hard light formed over his chest and hugged him to the backrest. He tapped in another string of commands with a new confidence, and then a hard light helmet enclosed the top half of his head, obscuring his eyes.

Sidon let out a wondrous breath at whatever he saw. With a few more button taps, his seat strafed to the side, and a smaller, matching chair appeared a few feet to his right. Wild nodded at the sight.

“Now we just need Teba,” he said. He turned to Zelda, and a harsh venom of his own coated his words. “With all four of us and two Divine Beasts, that _thing_ won’t stand a chance.”

The light that had grown in Zelda’s eyes dimmed, and her mouth shrank into a thin frown. She was quiet for a moment before she said, “Please don’t speak of it like that.”

Wild’s mouth thinned and a wall of ice rose in his gaze. “What?”

“The Leviathan. Please don’t…it’s dangerous, and we must stop it at any cost—even if that means killing it. But it didn’t come here of its own volition. It isn’t… _Malice._ It’s a victim, too, and we can’t forget that.” She searched Wild’s eyes for some sign of understanding. She searched his eyes for some sign of mitigation. All she found were two sharp sapphires that were so cold they burned.

“We don’t know how much time we have left,” he finally said. “You should get going.”

Zelda blinked and nodded. “Good luck to you both,” she said before pulling up her own Sheikah Slate. After a few taps of its screen, she was enveloped in the calming, blue light that unraveled and drifted away. 

Wild stared at where she’d been for another moment before turning and eyeing the empty chair waiting beside Sidon’s. Without any hesitation, he strode to and sat in the co-pilot’s seat. He examined the hard light keys on the chair’s arm, tapped a string of commands, and was embraced by the same kind of cuirass as Sidon. With another string of commands, a matching helmet materialized on his head, and it was Wild’s turn to let out a breath of awe.

Before his eyes was a visual display that allowed him to see the world as Vah Ruta saw it. From this view, he was gargantuan. He loomed over the entire Necluda region like a colossus, and he could easily see the silhouettes of the other three Divine Beasts on the horizon.

“This is….” he whispered.

 _“Marvelous,”_ Sidon finished, his voice as clear in Wild’s ears as if he were only inches away, rather than feet. 

The prince’s fingers flew over some of the keys on his arm-rest and a pair of hard light joysticks formed within easy reach. As he took them in hand and manipulated them, the views in his and Wild’s visors gave a tremendous _jolt._ The resounding noise of moving machinery reverbated in their bones as the Divine Beast lifted its head to the heavens and let out thunderous roar of its own. Icons flickered into existence along the corners of Wild’s view, showing him options for offensive and defensive weapons, tools, and abilities. As the view returned to an even plane, the prince’s voice spoke into the champion’s ears again. 

“I’m going to take it down to the Wetlands. Let’s find out exactly what this beautiful beast is capable of!” The view shook, the machinery thundered into motion, and then the world was in motion. Scenery rolled by all around Wild as the Divine Beast made its descent down the mountainside, down the side of the Zodobon Highlands, the world flying by so fast that Wild’s scalp _ached_ for the feeling of the wind pulling on his hair. With another tremendous _jolt_ that would’ve certainly caused an injury, had they not been strapped in by the safety harnesses, the gargantuan machine landed in the water of the Rutala River. 

The Divine Beast jolted again and made its way downriver, emerging into the wide valley of the Lanayru Wetlands and coming ashore to stand atop Kincean Island. Wild suddenly heard and felt a pair of joysticks materialize close enough to his hands to touch. He curled his fingers around them and steered them about, experimenting with how he could use them to aim and switch between weapon systems.

“All right, Link,” Sidon said, “let’s try out some of these attacks. According to these read-outs, you have control of most of the ranged weapons.”

“I see them,” Wild said.

“Good. Do you know the monster pier at the mouth of the Zora River?”

As his friend spoke, the world turned before Wild’s eyes as Sidon steered Vah Ruta to face the river in question. “Yeah,” the champion answered.

“We’ve been meaning to get rid of that eye sore for some time now. What do you say we take care of that? Let’s try the frozen blast!”

A circular targeting reticle appeared in the center of Wild’s vision. Smiling, he leaned the joysticks in his hands to place the reticle into position atop the interconnected complex of wood and bone. “Firing!”

He pressed the trigger on the right joystick, and a streak of ice energy soared through the air and landed directly on target, sending debris and water flying into the air. He pulled the left trigger, and a matching frozen blast imitated the first, with the same result. With a smile on his face, he sent a trio of consecutive blasts into the docks, obliterating even more of the structure. He envisioned each blast piercing through the Leviathan’s hide, and his smile widened.

“Excellent!” Sidon said. “Now try the ice blocks you had to shoot down when you boarded Vah Ruta to cleanse it!”

With a few key presses, Wild readied a cryonic block in every port they could be fired from. He fired one toward the one o’clock position, causing the cube to shatter on impact in the shallows below. Then he fired the block in the seven o’clock position, which met the same fate. Then he fired _all_ of the remaining blocks at once, sending up geysers of water and ice all over the Wetlands. His smile grew when he imagined then breaking the Leviathan’s legs and dropping the abomination to the ground. 

Sidon cheered and said, “Good! Now, let’s try the icicle barrage!” Wild set his sights on the final remnants of the docks, flicked the firing systems to the icicle barrage, and pressed both triggers.

Vah Ruta lifted its head, flexed its trunk out before it, and sent a swarm of ice spears out from its back that arced through the air and converged on the monster complex. Wood and stone and bone were all demolished in seconds as the full might of the Divine Beast wiped them from the face of the earth. But Wild did not see wood or stone or bone, he did not see docks or piers. He saw the Leviathan’s carcass, torn asunder in chunks, and the thought made his chest swell against the band wrapped around it with victory.

“Yes! Ha _ha!!”_ Sidon cheered again. “Link, I’m ‘holding out’ for a— a...what is it called when, when you Hylians, uh, close your hands into fists and, and touch them together? It’s a way of saying some—”

“A fist bump?”

“—thing like ‘good work frie’— ye— _a fist bump!_ Yes, that’s it, I’m ‘holding out’ for a fist bump!”

Wild laughed and said, “All right, hold on.” He pressed some keys on his arm-rest and dispelled the hard light visor from his head. He looked to his left and saw Sidon’s right hand, held out for a fist bump indeed. Smiling, he tried to reach out to complete the bump, but found himself stopped short. “Oh, hold on.”

He looked down to input a few more commands. The hard light harness over his chest disappeared, freeing Wild to lean far over the armrest and bump his fist against Sidon’s. _“Oh!”_ Sidon giggled with excitement. “This Leviathan has no idea what it’s in for!”

Wild settled back into his seat and sighed, his mind full of ruins and a coral statue. “No…it doesn’t.”

* * *

Once Wild, Sidon, and Zelda were whisked away, Warriors said, “So, we have our ancient arrows. Now, we need a back-up plan in case they’re ineffective. Back in the cook’s village, the traveler’s lightning spell actually made the beast stumble. Magic may perhaps be our best option to consider.”

“More like our _only_ option,” Legend muttered.

“But Thunder’s my strongest spell,” Hyrule said, “and it _only_ made the Leviathan stumble.”

“Thunder _alone_ made the beast stumble,” Warriors replied, “but what if we combined it with other spells? The old man, the hoarder, and the smith all have spells of their own, right?”

Legend nodded, rubbing his chin. “Combining spells is dangerous, but if there was a time to give it a shot, this is it.”

“I only have one offensive spell,” Time said, ”and it would be useless against this foe.”

“What can your other spells do?” the captain asked.

“One surrounds me with a magic barrier that enemies cannot attack through. The other is a teleportation spell that has to be cast twice—once to set a warp point, again to take me there.”

“I have two medallion-based spells,” Four said. “The veteran has two identical ones, and he used one of them back in the cook’s village.”

“Bombos,” Legend said. “Our other duplicate is the Quake Medallion, makes the ground rumble. Besides those two, I’ve got the Ether Medallion, which is a lightning spell like the traveler’s.”

“So the smith can go with you after all,” Warriors said, “and you can hit this thing with a combo attack.”

 _“How_ dangerous is this, Veteran?” Twilight asked.

Legend shrugged. “Depends on the spells being used, how much magic each caster has in reserve, their skill level, all kinds of things. Best case scenario is that the traveler, the smith, and I come away needing to drink some green potions.”

“And the worst case scenario?” Time asked. The answer he got was muttered with a scowl.

“That this overgrown lizard kills us all.”

_“Veteran.”_

Legend sighed. “The worst case scenario is that the three of us die. Either because the spells misfire or we push our reserves too far and drain ourselves dry.”

The table was quiet. Before anyone could formulate a response, the sound of a great roar caused all eight heroes’ heads to whip around to the southwest, their eyes wide. Outside the throne room, all of the moving and muttering _stilled_ for several seconds before a voice was heard crying, _“It’s all right, everyone, that is the Divine Beast Vah Ruta! Everything is fine, please resume moving along!”_ Other voices along the chain of evacuation repeated similar assurances, and the sounds of movement and whispering resumed.

The heroes relaxed, but none could deny that the tension in the air now hung a little heavier. Time leaned forward, his hands pressed into the table-top and his head lowered, until a voice pulled his attention back up.

“I have another suggestion,” Sky said with a frown. “In the final confrontation of my quest, I utilized a…’technique’ that I’m willing to try again. But, it is…well, _exceptionally_ dangerous, and I’d need the veteran and the traveler’s help.”

“Dangerous how?” Time asked, his voice tired, as he pushed himself back upright.

Sky couldn’t bring himself to look the old man in the eye as he answered. “If we don’t do it properly, it will probably kill me.”

The heroes stood in uneasy silence for a moment before Warriors finally asked, “What is this technique?”

“It’s a Skyward Strike, like ones I’ve used before, but…” Sky frowned, already dreading the responses he’d have to fight against, “first, I catch a bolt of lightning with the Master Sword.”

Silence, again, until Twilight said, “You _catch_ a bolt of lightning?”

“Yes.”

“And that…makes the attack more powerful?” Legend asked.

“Yes. The combined power of nature’s fury and the goddess’s magic is…potent.”

Legend opened his mouth to respond, but his mind overtook his words and closed it again. He finally nodded and said, “So you’d…want one of us to try and blast you with lightning.”

“No. I’d want _both_ of you to try, together.”

 _“What?!”_ Hyrule and Twilight yelled.

“Why both?” Warriors asked.

Sky paused for a moment, shifting his jaw and blinking while he tried to find the words. “Well, uh…I don’t actually— I’m making a— I just, uh…I thought that, if one bolt of lightning could create a more powerful Skyward Strike, then…well…” he shrugged, “two would…probably make it even _more_ powerful.”

Legend put one of his hands to the side of his head. “Are you _crazy?!_ We’d have to time the spells so that both bolts hit your blade at the _same time,_ otherwise the second bolt might fry you like a weathervane!”

“Yes, I know.” Sky’s eyes fell until he found whatever it was he needed to look at his comrades with certainty in his spirit again. His eyes locked with Warriors’s, and the captain saw in them a steel that could not be dissuaded. That steel shone in his words, too. “It is as I said. If we don’t do it properly, it will probably kill me.”

Twilight ran his hand through his hair and shook his head. “Are our best options _really_ only ones that could get us killed?”

No one one had an answer for that. After a long silence, Wind quietly said, “I really hope the cook and the prince stop it.”

Warriors gave a small nod, his eyes cast down to the map. Just as quietly, he said, “I do, too, Sailor.”

“What do we do if none of these work?” Hyrule asked. The eyes of all seven other heroes turned to him, and he frowned at the feeling all of their gazes put in his chest. He tried to brush it aside and put all of his focus on Warriors. “You said we need to prepare for the worst-case scenario, right? So, what if we try _all_ of these ideas and none of them work?”

Six sets of eyes turned from Hyrule to Warriors, who returned the traveler’s gaze for a long moment. “Then we save as many people we can,” the captain said as he looked over all of his comrades. “So if the Leviathan gets past the cook, hit it with those ancient arrows. If they don’t work, try combined spells. If _they_ don’t work, use the lightning strike. And if _that_ doesn’t work, warp back here with the old man’s spell and…just…” his eyes fell, his shoulders sagged, and he couldn’t stop the sigh that escaped from his lips, “get as many people out of here as you can.”

After a pregnant pause, he straightened his shoulders and looked around the table with steel in his eyes. “All of you get down to the lower levels, near the shrine. Sky, Old Man, you two will help the guards usher people to the upper mezzanine until the cook comes back with his warning. Smith, Hoarder, Traveler, start devising some spell combinations. Rancher, you’ll be waiting by the shrine. As soon as the cook returns, send him right back and let the rest of us know, including me. I’ll be at the eastern bridge.”

“I could use the champion’s favorite signal so I wouldn’t have to run all the way up to you,” Twilight said.

“No, that might stir up a panic,” the captain replied with a shake of the head. “The people are going to become anxious enough as it is once we start urging them to hurry, we don’t want to scare them into a stampede. Just come tell me and get back down to the main bridge. Sailor, that just leaves your special mission: I want to get the king out of here sooner rather than later, and it would set my mind at ease a great deal if a hero escorted him to the evacuation zone, so I want you on the job.” He looked around the table and asked, “Any questions?”

Wind glowered at the captain and said, “You’re just trying to get me out of danger because I’m ‘a kid.’”

“I _am_ trying to get you out of danger,” Warriors shot back with a glare of his own, “but I’m not lying to you, Sailor. Yes, you’re young and small, and I _don’t_ want you near this thing. But you’re a Hero of Hyrule, and I trust the king’s life in your hands more than I trust it in the hands of his _entire_ retinue of guards. If you want to come back after you’ve gotten him to the lake, there’s nothing I can do to stop you—even if I told you to stay—but until then, we need to get this king out of here. So _please,_ at least give me a _little_ peace of mind and get him out of here.” Wind gaped at the older hero for a moment, completely unsure what to say, before he finally looked away with unmistakable shame. Warriors took a centering breath before asking the table again, “Anyone else?” 

He looked amongst them all. He gave them time to organize their thoughts. To voice their last concerns, to throw out any more desperate ideas. But he was only met with silence. When no other answers came, he gave a small nod. “All right, then,” he said. “Let’s move out.”


	8. Vah Ruta vs. Godzilla: King to F5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content Warnings: Self-endangering behavior rooted in severe denial, violence and destruction typical for a daikaiju-vs.-giant-mecha fight.
> 
> If you want to add an additional layer to your reading experience, here's a short piece of music to play in another tab when you get to the line "And there it was." 
> 
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vD8nPGrZFnY

The eight heroes descended the staircase to the central mezzanine. At the bottom, most of them continued on to one of the long, bending stairways to the lower plaza. Warriors and Wind split off instead to approach King Dorephan, who stood near the railing overlooking the plaza below. When he reached the railing, the captain cast a glance below and found crowds swarming about the plaza like bees in a hive. Zora guards ushered people out of the inn and the general store, urging them towards the stairways to the upper levels, but many moved at their own pace and in their own paths in and out of doorways. The captain frowned as the thought crossed his mind that many of the people in the Domain might not, in fact, be worried at all about a problem they couldn’t see right now.

“Your Majesty,” Warriors said, waiting until King Dorephan’s gaze fell to him before continuing. “As the sovereign head of state in this Domain, your safety is imperative to the security of your people. In their interest, I would like to have my comrade here escort you to the evacuation zone.”

Dorephan looked to Wind for a moment before offering them both a small smile. “Thank you, heroes, but I must refuse.”

That wasn’t what Warriors had expected to hear. After blinking away his confusion, he said, “I’m afraid I don’t understand, Your Highness.” Dorephan’s smile faded and he turned back to observe the people in the lower plaza.

“Every life in Zora’s Domain is my responsibility as king. Every citizen, every guest. As long as even one soul remains in this sculpted city, I shall not abandon them. I will be the last to leave, or I shan’t leave at all.”

After the captain processed what he’d just heard, he set his jaw before stepping up beside the king. “Your Majesty, I understand the sense of responsibility you feel, but,” he took another step forward and lowered his voice, “with all due respect, that responsibility is _why_ you must evacuate. This Leviathan, it— you— there is a very real chance that it will reach this place and destroy it. There is a _very real chance_ that your people are going to lose their home. _They will need you,_ Your Highness. _Please.”_

Dorephan’s gaze drifted off toward the canyon—toward the Wetlands. He spoke in a voice that was low and immovable. “I will not leave even one person behind to ensure my own safety, Hero. If this is where I meet my end, then I will die knowing that my people will be safe in the hands of my son.”

Warriors took a deep breath and considered his next move. Not his next words—he had a very clear idea of the point he needed to make—but whether or not to send Wind away first. He detested the idea of utilizing this tactic in any context, but deploying it in front of his young friend seemed especially abhorrent to him. Trying to shield him from seeing it, however, would no doubt only increase his ire. Warriors chewed the inside of his cheek. It was a difficult choice.

But difficult decisions must be made, regardless. 

The captain swallowed the bitter taste rising in the back of his throat and did his best to bore a hole into the side of Dorephan’s face with his gaze. “Your Majesty, if the Leviathan reaches this city, then there is a chance that your son will be dead. There will be no heir to care for your people, there will only be you. _You have to evacuate.”_

A sharp, dangerous silence hung over the conversation. The heroes waited for a response with the feeling of steel wires pulling their spines apart. But when the king finally spoke, he only sounded quiet and afraid.

“I have faith in Link. I have faith in my son. They will stop this beast.” A commotion drew his eyes toward the northern end of the central mezzanine and pulled him from whatever hole he’d fallen into. The resolution returned to his voice when he spoke again. “If you wish to help me, Hero, please get to the eastern bridge. We’re using rito volunteers to fly children to the lake, and some of them may be more willing to part from their parents if a dashing knight such as yourself is there to reassure them.”

With that, the king made his way toward the commotion and left the heroes where they stood. Warriors stared after him, shards of glass tearing his insides to pieces, but he could only take another deep breath and try to swallow down the sickness building in his chest. 

“Come on, Sailor,” he said. “There’re still people we can help.” He turned and made his way towards the eastern bridge, Wind following behind his left shoulder. After a few steps, the captain mustered up the nerve to say, “I’m sorry you had to see that, Sailor.”

“It’s okay,” Wind said. “I’m sorry I…couldn’t help.”

“I don’t think anyone could’ve helped him,” Warriors said with a shake of his head. “But I’m glad you’re here with me….” He looked back over his shoulder and offered a small grin to his young friend—one that, despite his effort, didn’t quite reach his eyes. “You’re much better at calming children than me, so you can do most of the work.”

* * *

From where they sat on Vah Ruta’s teleportation pad, Wild and Sidon had an excellent view of the small islands that littered the shallows of the Lanayru Wetlands. The sky above them was a rich tapestry of orange, pink, and deep purple. Had he been asked, Wild would’ve thought for sure that the Leviathan would’ve been sighted well before now, but if it had decided to take a break somewhere along the way, he certainly had no complaints. The longer it no-showed, the more people who could be safely evacuated from the Domain. As far as he was concerned, the thing could keep on taking its sweet time.

As far as he was concerned, the thing could do everyone a favor and simply lie in a ditch and die.

For now, though, he was willing to wait. He was patient. He had some rich apples and a wonderful view to keep him occupied in the meantime. The sounds of his friend munching on a hydromelon beside him came to a pause, and after a moment, Sidon said, “I can’t believe you’re traveling with the _Hero of Time.”_

Wild finished chewing his bite before swallowing. “I can’t believe I _forgot_ that he was engaged to a zora princess.”

“You had far more pressing concerns, my friend, and besides—meeting all of those heroes certainly must’ve thrown you for a loop.”

Wild conceded the point with a hum and raised his apple towards his mouth, but stopped short of taking a bite, his eyes widening. “I wonder if _Malon_ knows.”

“Ma-wuhn?” Sidon asked, his mouth full of hydromelon.

“His wife.” Wild pondered the possibility more as he bit into his apple.

Sidon stared off into the distance, a look of concentration on his face as he chewed. After he swallowed, he sat still for a moment, then looked to Wild and quietly asked, “Is _she_ a zora?”

Wild coughed and sputtered. Sidon reached over and thumped his back until he waved him off. “No,” he finally spit out. “Nope. She’s Hylian.”

“Oh.”

Wild gave another cough before he finally seemed to relax again. “I mean, she said he’s told her _everything,_ so, she probably knows.”

“Oh, you’ve met her?”

“Yeah. She’s _really_ sweet, beautiful singing voice. She runs a horse ranch.”

Sidon hummed in thought. “It seems cruel, though, to agree to a marriage engagement and then abandon his fiancée.”

Wild blinked and shrugged. “Well, he did say there was a misunderstanding.”

Where Sidon’s last hum sounded thoughtful, this one sounded uncertain. “The rules are _quite_ clear, though….”

“Do you trust me, Sidon?”

“Of _course_ I do!”

“Then believe me when I say that if there is anything the old man is certainly not, it’s _cruel._ If he says there was a misunderstanding, there was a misunderstanding. Besides, there’s no misunderstanding the way he and Malon look at each other. No princess or queen, or anything, could’ve gotten between them.”

“Well…” Sidon’s eyes lowered to Wild’s chest—to the armor he wore—and a smile bloomed on his face. “I suppose I can’t argue with true love.”

While Sidon munched on some more of his melon, Wild lost himself in thought. His eyes clouded over and his apple sat forgotten in his hand.The silence stretched on for minutes until the champion finally said, “I’m _going_ to stop it, Sidon.” Sidon’s melon paused inches from his mouth before he looked to Wild. The champion turned and met his gaze with a look that seemed, to the prince, to bear equal parts determination and desperation. “I’m not…. I _won’t_ fail her again. I promise you, that _thing_ won’t even _see_ your home.”

Sidon frowned. “You didn’t…. Link, you….” He looked away and set his fruit down, unable to ignore the cold stillness in the air. “Do you…do you not believe the princess?”

Wild blinked. “What?”

“When she said that the Leviathan was a victim…that we shouldn’t forget that….”

Wild’s gaze remained on Sidon’s face, but he didn’t see his friend.

_Numar takes a deep, shuddering breath and looks away for a moment before he mutters, “We never saw something like this coming.”_

“I believe her,” he finally said as he looked away.

_Amira and Ivee sit beside each other on the floor, their backs pressed against the wall. They are huddled, with tears in their eyes, around the young Azu, whose breath hitches with sobs and hiccups. Ivee mutters, “I know, I know, I— I want him too, I want Papa too—”_

“I believe she really believes it.”

_He freezes, his eyes fixed on the object of his despair. It is the three-pronged head of Mipha’s trident. Bent, twisted. Warped, malformed. Broken._

“I just don’t care.”

Wild stood, walked to the edge of the teleportation pad, and threw what was left of his apple into the distance. He watched it sail out on an arc and disappear below, falling so far that he knew he wouldn’t even hear it splash into the water. He lifted his gaze and let it wander, following the shadow-line of the horizon against the heavy orange and purple sky. His eyes traced hills, distant trees, distant mountain peaks, and—

He froze. He knew what he saw in the distance, creeping from behind the Sahasra Slope. He knew what he saw towering over any structure in the land. He knew even as he lifted his Sheikah Slate before his face and looked through its scope.

And there it was.

The Leviathan strode northward. Wild estimated that it was likely in Nabi Lake, seconds from destroying the Eagus Bridge—if it hadn’t done so already. It would reach the flatlands between the Hylia River and the Lanayru Wetlands in a matter of minutes. He spun around, tapping on the screen of his slate.

“It’s here,” he said, “get Vah Ruta ready, I’m warning the others.”

Sidon was already up and running toward the main control unit before the champion had even finished speaking. As the blue threads of light whisked off to Zora’s Domain, Sidon bolted through the interior of the great machine until he reached the MCU. He placed his hand on the main terminal, and the Divine Beast awoke. He darted to the pilot’s chair that’d winked into existence behind him and took his place.

“All right, you beast,” Sidon muttered as he typed in the commands to materialize his harness, visor, and Wild’s co-pilot chair, “this is quite far enough.”

* * *

Zora’s Domain was covered in shadow and illuminated by the turquoise glow of luminous stones when Wild materialized on the Ne’ez Yohma Shrine. He barely managed to stop short of running into Twilight. “It’s here!”

He started to move around him, but the rancher held him in place and said, “Get back there, now, I’ll tell the others!”

Twilight was bolting up the stairs before Wild even started to glow blue. At the top, in the entryway to the shrine chamber, the three spell-casters turned away from the shrine and ran around the statue of Mipha, pushing through the crowds toward the Domain’s main bridge.

“Sky! It’s time!” Legend called to his comrade, who stood at the base of the northern stairway urging people to remain calm. At the veteran’s words, Sky eased his way out of the staircase and started running toward the main bridge. Twilight pushed his way up the other staircase and found Time halfway up, speaking to a Hylian woman who seemed upset. 

“Old Man, it’s time to go!” he said. Time looked between his young friend and the woman with a grimace. 

“Time to go?” she asked. “Go where? Where are you going, what is going on, _why is this happening?”_

Time started pulling away from the woman. “I’m sorry, miss, this— I can’t explain right now, but I have to go— Just continue up the staircase toward the bridge, follow the directions of the guards, and _please_ remain calm.”

He trotted down the stairs as fast as he could while Twilight continued upward at a run, brushing past people at every step. On the central mezzanine, he blazed through every opening in the mass of people he could find until his eyes found Warriors. Their eyes met as Twilight came to a stop beside him.

“It’s here,” he said and turned away—but was stopped by the captain’s hand, locked around his arm in an iron grip.

“Walk,” the captain ordered, his voice low. “Don’t run.”

Twilight looked at him, confused for a moment, before he saw the faces of the people nearby, their eyes fixed on him, and the fear in their eyes. When he finally nodded, Warriors let him go free. He restrained every burning muscle in his body and walked away, his spine straight and his eyes locked forward. Warriors turned and met Wind’s gaze on the other side of the bridge and nodded to him. The sailor replied with a fierce nod of his own. The captain crossed to the nearest zora guard and leaned into whisper into his ear.

“Tell your captain to start moving people across the northwestern bridge, _now.”_

“But there’s nowhere for them to go, there,” the guard replied, “the basin-shelf is a dead-end.”

 _“Tell him._ We need to get as many people off of this tower as we can _right now.”_ Warriors walked to another zora guard and took a megaphone from her hands. Putting it to his lips, he spoke with a calm force that left no room for questions. “Ladies and gentlemen, and any other nouns you prefer, the guards will soon begin redirecting some of you towards the northwestern bridge! Please follow the instructions of any officials promptly, and move quickly, so that others may proceed quickly as well!”

Twilight made it a quarter of the way down the bending staircase to the lower plaza before he started trotting, pushing past people as politely as he could. He made it to the halfway point before he started jogging, bumping shoulders and throwing back apologies. He was running at full speed and almost barreling through people before he even reached the last quarter. From the bottom, he ran for the main bridge, where the other five waited, all visibly anxious to move. Once he was near enough, they turned and sprinted down the path.

* * *

Wild materialized on Vah Ruta and sprinted toward the MCU. He leapt into his waiting seat and activated his harness and visor, his heart hammering in his chest. Through the Divine Beast’s eyes, he saw the Leviathan lumbering down the slope near the Millennio Sandbar. The ground trembled as Vah Ruta stepped forward, crossing through the Wetlands to meet its foe. Trees rattled and stones loosened when the Leviathan’s foot planted into the shallows with a spray of water.

The Divine Beast stopped and let out a mighty roar, drawing its line in the sand among the Goponga Village ruins. The Leviathan roared a response, its stride never faltering. Wild glared through Vah Ruta’s eyes—and realized for the first time that he could see the Leviathan’s. He looked into the windows to the beast’s soul—and found two mirrors.

They were rage. They were pain. They _burned._

Wild scowled. Vah Ruta roared again, louder. And the Leviathan roared back, unbowed. Not even _remotely._ He didn’t know what he’d have to do to stop this thing—to _kill_ this thing—but he would do it, whatever it took. He would make it pay for the harm it’d done, for the pain it’d inflicted. He would protect those people. He would protect his dearest friend’s home.

He had to.

The Leviathan finally came to a halt, with only Goponga Island separating it from Vah Ruta. It let loose its bone-shaking roar, sending ripples through the water that traveled to the ends of the Wetlands. The Divine Beast responded with a roar of its own. Both beasts roared together, and the world shook from their rage and determination.

“Let’s make the first move, Link,” Sidon said, “fire the cryonic blocks!”

“Firing,” Wild replied as he readied a barrage of ice blocks to fire from Vah Ruta’s right side. Initializing the guided targeting system he’d discovered while practicing, he placed the targeting reticle on the Leviathan’s chest and established a lock-on. With a press of the trigger, the blocks launched from their firing ports. Wild leaned the joysticks in his hands, guiding the blocks into a wide arc that put them on a direct course with the Leviathan. The beast gave a bark, following the blocks with its eyes. 

The first two blocks collided into its gut and shattered, doubling it over with a pained roar. The third and fourth shattered on its shoulder and the side of its neck, and the Leviathan stumbled to the side. It recovered quickly, standing upright and roaring its outrage to the heavens.

“Another volley!” Sidon cried.

“Firing.” Wild fired a barrage from the left side, steering the blocks on course for another series of direct hits—but the Leviathan spun, _much_ faster than he thought it capable of moving, dodging aside and swinging its tail about like a flail. It smashed through the first two blocks before the third and fourth sailed past the beast, slamming into the hillside behind it and disintegrating.

The Leviathan turned to face Vah Ruta and roared before hunching forward and _charging,_ faster than any being of its size should possibly be able to move.

Sidon’s eyes widened for just a moment before he grimaced and pressed his joysticks forward, yelling “Brace yourself!”

Vah Ruta lowered its head, aiming to get under the Leviathan’s shoulder, but the beast was too fast. It _slammed_ shoulder-first into the Divine Beast and pushed it upwards. Sidon reacted quickly, pulling Vah Ruta back to stand upright on its hind legs and press downward with its forelegs, putting all of its weight on the Leviathan’s upper body. The damnable thing roared before spinning to the side, rotating out from under Vah Ruta and swinging its tail around to _strike_ the Divine Beast in the side as it fell back down to its feet.

The machine let out a pained wail and began to stumble and list to its side. Sidon and Wild both groaned and leaned against the tilt as the zora struggled— _fought_ —to keep the Divine Beast on its feet. Just when Vah Ruta finally regained its footing, the Leviathan drove another shoulder-charge into its side. Sidon bore down on the joysticks to fight against the pressure and keep the machine upright.

“Firing blocks!” Wild cried as he readied a volley on the machine’s left side, where the Leviathan was pressing all of its weight. All four blocks fired and scored point-blank hits, shattering against the rough hide of the monster’s lower waist. It stumbled back, doubled-over again, and a low, pained roar bellowed from its chest.

Sidon took the opening and swung Vah Ruta’s head about, whipping its trunk in the same manner as the Leviathan’s tail, and _smashed_ it against the side of the beast’s head, turning it away and nearly toppling it. But the beast kept its footing and remained standing, roaring in pain and fury.

On a distant ridge of coral and stone—where the first part of Zora’s Domain’s history was carved—the six Heroes of Courage came to a halt on the farthest-reaching outcropping they could find. It was clearly nowhere near tall enough for them to try and fire the ancient arrows into the Leviathan’s eyes or mouth. Not even the depths of the river below would bring the beast low enough for their purposes. But it was high enough for them to see _some_ of the battle in the distance, backlit by the final minutes of daylight. Hyrule’s eyes were as wide as dinner plates as he let out a quiet, “Whoa.”

Sidon pressed the advantage, and Vah Ruta gave a charge of its own. The crown of its head _drove_ into the Leviathan’s chest and _pushed,_ trying its damndest to topple the monster. But the titan stayed rooted, its feet digging massive trenches into the pond-bed as it was pushed back. When it finally stopped, the Leviathan bent down and latched its arms around Vah Ruta’s trunk. Both giants roared as the Leviathan shifted its weight and dragged Vah Ruta off its feet, slamming it into the hillside of an island like a flail. The earth shook, the island disappeared in a cloud of dirt, and the heroes felt their hearts seize at the sight.

Inside the Divine Beast, Wild and Sidon groaned, held in their chairs by the hard-light harnesses on their chests. “Link,” Sidon moaned.

“I’m on it,” Wild gritted out as he readied the frozen blast. Vah Ruta lifted its head enough to look at the Leviathan looming over it, then a flash of hardened ice shot from the cannon in its right tusk. The blast _punched_ into the Leviathan’s chest, forcing the beast to stumble back with a roar of pain. A blast from the left trunk caught it in the face, spinning the beast away and sending it doubling-over for a third time. Vah Ruta’s machinery groaned as the Divine Beast lifted itself upward and turned to face the Leviathan. Wild readied the icicle barrage, and set a target-lock on the monster. With a press of both triggers, the ice spears launched into the sky and arced towards the Leviathan.

But the damn thing _dashed_ to the side at the last moment, all of the spears slamming uselessly into the pond and shattering. The Leviathan roared, then spun about with another tail whip, this one across Vah Ruta’s head. The world went topsy turvy before Wild and Sidon’s eyes, and before they knew it, the beast had grabbed Vah Ruta’s trunk again.

“Oh no you _don’t,”_ Sidon growled. The monster tried to throw the Divine Beast again, but this time, Sidon engaged the water jets on the bottoms of the machine’s feet and tilted them against the angle of the throw. All of the monster’s momentum was negated, and Sidon adjusted the machine to land on its feet. Unfortunately for the Leviathan, it still held the Divine Beast’s trunk in its arms.

With a mighty roar of his own, Sidon _flung_ the trunk up with all of the force the machine could muster, and it was the Leviathan that was sent flying off its feet, roaring before it fell from above and _crashed_ into the side of another island hilltop like a meteorite. “Allright, Link,” he yelled, “hose it!”

Wild readied the high-pressure water cannon, aimed for the downed Leviathan, and fired. Vah Ruta’s trunk lifted, pointed toward the monster, and sent a long, thin beam straight into its chest. Not a laser beam, not a beam of energy, but a beam of _water,_ fired at such intense velocity as to cut through _steel._ The Leviathan roared, no, it _yowled_ in anguish as the beam drilled and drilled and drilled into its hide.

Sidon initiated the water jets in Vah Ruta’s feet, raising it off the ground and letting the high-pressure cannon propel it backwards to put distance between the two giants. He brought the machine back down to the ground, its feet digging into the pond-bed. The water cannon ceased firing as Wild switched weapons. “Firing icicle barrage!” he cried as he squeezed the triggers.

Once again, a storm of ice spears flew from Vah Ruta, and arced through the air towards their target. This time, they scored direct hits, shattering on the limp form of the roaring Leviathan. “All right, Link, let’s finish this,” Sidon said. “Time for the _main cannon.”_

Wild only growled as he aimed the cannon and held both of his triggers. A red laser pointer ran from between Vah Ruta’s tusks to the writhing form of the Leviathan, a frequent beeping noise growing faster and faster. He only briefly revelled in the feeling of being on _this_ side of the laser, for once, before the pointer disappeared and was replaced by a wide beam of black and blue energy, the same beam that had shaved away at Calamity Ganon’s hide and brought it to its knees before the hero. This beam _burrowed_ and _tunneled_ into the side of the island, boiled the water around it, and wrought destruction and doom on the wretched monstrosity. The beam burned and burned and _burned and burned and_ **_burned_ ** until Wild finally released the triggers.

The beam vanished, and the air was left quiet and still. Only clouds of dust and steam moved. 

The beast was silent.

 _“Yes!!”_ Hyrule cried and cheered alongside Legend and Four. Time, Sky, and Twilight let out huge sighs of relief.

 _“Yes!!”_ Sidon cheered. _“We did it!!_ We _did_ it, Link, that was _incredible!! Ha HA!!”_

Wild laughed. He hadn’t expected to laugh, but he laughed. He laughed and let out a sigh of _such_ relief. For the first time in days, the invisible band around his chest loosened, it almost vanished completely. He laughed and smiled, and Sidon whooped and hollered and—

The ground trembled beneath them.

They froze. They both froze and stared at the cloud of dust and smoke where something now moved. Something rose. First, they saw the fins. Then the shoulders. Then the head and neck. As the smoke and the dust and the steam cleared, their chests were hollowed by the revelation before them—the beast did not have so much as a scratch on it. It bore no wounds. It bore no scars. It bore no burns.

Only its _eyes_ burned.

Before either Wild or Sidon could think, the Leviathan’s dorsal fins glowed a brilliant blue, its head leaned forward and mouth opened, and the beast spewed out an energy beam of its own straight into Vah Ruta’s face.

They both cried out in pain when the blast hit. The beam itself did not hurt them, but it _blinded_ them. The world was awash in such a bright, blue and white light that it burned even through their closed eyelids. The Divine Beast rocked back, and with its pilot unable to see and correct its balance, it toppled back onto its hindquarters.

The beam halted for one, desperate moment, before it blasted them again and pushed the machine back even farther, toppling it into its side. The beam halted and started again, hosing them down as the watcher cannon had done the Leviathan. Beneath them, the ground trembled with its gargantuan steps as it approached, blasting Vah Ruta as it went.

“I can’t get up!” Sidon yelled. “It’s pinning us down, I can’t move us!”

The beam halted, then started again, and the ground shook harder and _harder and_ **_harder._ ** Finally, the beam stopped, the light vanished—and when the pilots could see again, they saw that the beast had them by the trunk again.

With a mighty roar, the Leviathan swung the trunk upward and flung Vah Ruta up into the air, then swung the trunk down again and brought the machine crashing to the earth.

Wild and Sidon were jostled in their seats, their bodies held in place by the safety harnesses but their arms and legs flailing about limply. They barely had a chance to breathe before they felt themselves lifted _up_ again, then slammed back _down_ again. Then _again_ and _again_ and _again_ and suddenly, the visors before Wild and Sidon’s eyes flickered and faded, barely visible before them. Wild looked down and saw the chairs they sat in and the harnesses that held them in place flicker and fade as well.

The Leviathan roared as it flung Vah Ruta upwards again, but it did not bring it back down—it flung the machine straight up and swung it over its head in a full, 180° arc. Wild and Sidon screamed as they fell, and at the precise moment Vah Ruta hit the ground, their seats and safety harness disappeared completely, and they flew towards the wall like cannonballs.

_“Sido—”_

And the world went black.

* * *

On the ridge overlooking the Zora River, the six Heroes of Courage stood in complete silence. Their mouths all hung agape, their eyes all held volatile mixtures of fear and pain. In the distance, the Leviathan lifted its maw to the heavens and let loose a roar of victory.

“We can’t beat it,” Four whispered. His voice was so quiet that Time wondered if the young man had even meant to speak the words aloud.

“No,” the old man finally said as he drew his bow. “We probably can’t.” He drew one of the ancient arrows from his quiver and nocked it to his bowstring.

After a pause, Sky took a deep breath and did the same. “It’s been an honor to have known you all.”

Legend and Hyrule readied their bows. Twilight stared at the beast in the distance for almost ten seconds, his eyes clouded and lost. Then they burned the fog away with a fierce light, glaring at the Leviathan as he readied his bow. Four drew his sword and pulled his small bracelet of medallions from his bottomless pouch, holding them tightly in his right hand. They all stood there, silent and waiting, as the light faded completely and their fates—whatever they may be—approached with steps that shook the earth beneath them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next week's chapter is my favorite, and I can't fucking wait to finally share it with you all.


	9. An Act of God

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content Warning: depiction of a major disaster involving panicking crowds, acts of desperation, non-specific allusion to mass loss of life, and children in life-threatening danger. In a word, it's Chaos.
> 
> This is the chapter that earns the M rating. If you have trouble getting through the ship-sinking half of _Titanic_ or watching footage of the morning of September 11th, this chapter may be rough for you.

The ground shook and the end drew nearer. The heroes stood, waiting, their eyes fixed on the towering shadow that approached them. Their nerves screamed like sirens of fear and adrenaline. The ground shook and the end drew nearer. They each steadied their breathing and worked to control their racing hearts. They each pushed away the fear and uncertainty that rose when their treacherous minds turned to the champion. The ground shook and the end drew nearer.

When the Leviathan was in range, Time wordlessly raised his bow, pulled back the string, and sprung the ancient energy blade to life. Four other blades winked into existence around him as—

_thwock_

—he loosed his arrow. 

_thwock thwock thwockthwock_

Four identical darts followed close behind. They reached the apex of their arcs, turned down, and drove into the beast’s hide. 

_psheEW_

_psheEW psheEW psheEWshwEW_

Small, blue explosions peppered the beast’s hips and waist, and its roar echoed along the walls of stone and coral.

But it was not deterred in the slightest.

The heroes kept firing their arrows. Hit, after hit, after hit illuminated the monster’s cragged flesh, but did nothing to slow its stride. Time blew a hard breath through his nose and stowed away his bow. “Veteran, Smith, Traveler,” he cried, “spells!”

Legend and Hyrule stashed their own bows away and drew their swords, the former reaching into the collar of his tunic to withdraw his necklace of medallions. With their respective flourishes, the three heroes each cast a spell directly on the Leviathan. Bombos blasts, twice as many as had been used in Hateno, erupted up and down the monster’s flesh, punching it again and again and again and again. As these fireballs peppered the beast, streaks of lightning reached down from the sky and stabbed the Leviathan, detonating showers of sparks. The display lit the night sky in oranges and whites that could be seen for miles.

The beast stumbled, roared to the sky, and resumed its stride.

Legend grabbed another of the medallions on his necklace and looked to Hyrule. “Water plan!”

The traveler nodded back and readied himself. They both waited as the beast took another step, and then another, and then another, until one of its feet crashed into the river. With a pair of flourishes, the heroes brought branches of lighting down onto the water itself, setting it alight with an immeasurable voltage. The Leviathan finally, _finally,_ came to a halt, roaring in pain as arcs of electricity crawled along its hide. Hope sprouted in their hearts and smiles cracked on Sky and Twilight’s faces—until the charge ceased and the Leviathan took its second step into the river.

They were still for only a moment before Sky put away his bow, drew the Master Sword, and stepped up to the edge of the outcropping. The Chosen Hero turned to his comrades with a look of calm focus and only said, “I’m ready.”

Legend and Hyrule’s eyes met, and neither missed the trepidation in the other’s gaze—but they steeled themselves. The veteran gripped his Ether Medallion and said, “One.”

“Two,” Hyrule said.

Legend started his flourish and yelled, “Three!” as Hyrule started his. Sky thrust the Master Sword into the air and a blue light filled up the length of the blade like water in a glass, reaching the tip at the same moment that two bolts of lightning struck the blessed metal, coating it in a living sheen of voltage. The blade shook with power, sending vibrations down Sky’s arm that rattled his teeth. He reared the Master Sword back and _swung,_ flinging a sparking, crackling crescent of holy might streaking upward in the air like a reverse comet. The heroes watched, breath halted in their throats, as the Skyward Strike flew up and up and _up_ and _shattered_ against the underside of the Leviathan’s muzzle with a small explosion of sparks and light.

The beast recoiled as if hit by an uppercut and stumbled _back._ It tottered and leaned, and the heroes braced themselves because _it was going to fall—_ until it caught its balance, stood upright, and roared. They gaped, their hearts plummeting to their stomachs. Before they could even consider their next move, the beast’s dorsal fins began to glow and its blue breath beam streaked through the air and struck the near wall of the canyon.

The Leviathan began _carving._

Stone and coral was sheared away and the ground quaked beneath the heroes. Four fell to his hands and knees, Hyrule and Twilight held on to each other to stay upright. Sky stumbled back, the Master Sword falling from his hand to the stone with a clatter before he was able to catch and right himself. But the Leviathan sent another blast against the rockface, and he was flung forward—toward the ridge’s edge.

Time’s heart froze in his chest and he dove forward, hand outstretched. Sky landed shoulder-first on the stone, bounced, and rolled over the edge a second and a half before Time landed on his chest, his hand uselessly stretching out over the abyss. _“Sky!!”_

His gaze frantically searched the dust and darkness below. Another hero dropped to his knees beside him, and after a moment, Twilight’s voice said, “There he is! Look!”

Time looked to his friend and followed his pointed finger just in time to see Sky’s sailcloth, unfurled as a parachute, disappear into the dust—somewhere between the canyon wall and the Leviathan’s tail. Shaking away the images that tried to spring to life in his mind, Time tried to push himself up to his feet. Another tremor from another carving blast briefly stymied him, but he finally regained his footing and moved back toward the others. “Come on, we’re warping back!”

Four and Hyrule joined Twilight in easy reach, but Legend stood off to the side, his Tempered Sword in his left hand and the Master Sword in his right. Time realized, for the first time, that the veteran was struggling to catch his breath. “Get back to the Domain,” Legend said, “I have one last idea!”

“Wait, _Veteran—”_ Before Time could say another word, Legend turned and _sped_ off, his Pegasus Boots carrying him away faster than the Bunny Hood had ever made Time. The old man growled and pointed to Twilight as he said, “Get after him!”

“On it!” The rancher was already running before the old man had even finished his order.

“Wait—” Hyrule tried to say, but Time already had him and Four in his grips, and the three of them vanished in a flash of green magic. Twilight reached into the collar of his tunic and grasped the Twili crystal, shifting into his wolf form and bolting after the veteran’s trail.

* * *

Legend followed the path back toward the ornate coral bridge the heroes had originally come across, the ground ceaselessly shaking under his feet. It took all of his concentration to not lose his footing and face-plant, an injury which would be catastrophic—if not _fatal—_ at this speed. When he was speeding across the bridge, he looked to his right and was greeted with the sight of the Leviathan forcing its way through the opening in the canyon that it’d widened.

 _He stumbled and felt his stomach fly into his throat—_ but he caught his footing at the last second, kept his eyes forward, and pressed on to the other side. Slowing back to his natural speed, he took up a position on another section of coral ridge. Gasping for air, he shifted the Master Sword to his left hand, holding it and the Tempered Sword in an awkward grip. He pulled his necklace of medallions up and over his head with his right hand, his cap falling to the ground behind him. He brought both of his hands together, both hilts and all three medallions squeezed in his grasp, and focused _all_ of his magic reserve on them. The swords began to vibrate in his hands, their blades glowing white and orange. He focused, and focused, letting the rumbling blades shake his bones to the marrow as he lifted the swords on high and _swung._

The tremors in the canyon intensified. They doubled, they _tripled,_ and cracks started to form in the rock walls on either side of the Leviathan. They grew and glowed until—

**_CR-POW CR-POW CR-PWOCR-POWCR-POWCR-POW_ **

—chunks of stone and coral _rocketed_ out like cannonballs, each fired by blasts of flame and lightning from within the stone walls. They struck the beast’s hide and shattered, stopping the monster dead in its tracks. It lifted its head to the heavens and screeched in agony as it was pelted by stone and coral bullets. Legend fell to his hands and knees, the swords and medallions clattering on the stone and rattling from the explosions. He swallowed deep, rasping gasps of air, and the world faded in and out of darkness around him. Beside him, a wolf shifted into the shape of a scowling Hylian.

“Veteran!” Twilight yelled, one hand on Legend’s back and the other on his chest. His gaze was pulled up when the stone cannons ceased their fire, and the Leviathan toppled over against the opposite side of the canyon. He didn’t wait to see if it would fall completely. The rancher darted over and scooped up the swords and medallions before stuffing them into his bottomless pouch. “Come on, Veteran, we have to go!”

He draped one of Legend’s arms over his shoulder and lifted him up to his feet. The ground trembled under them and almost toppled them again, but Twilight managed to keep them upright. In the canyon, the Leviathan rose to its full height and roared to the heavens. Twilight’s eyes widened when he saw a small blue star, surrounded by a sun-colored ring of light, wink in and out of existence in the gap between the beast’s jaws. It winked again and again, the monster’s form became awash in a flash of white light, and then a blue pulse of energy _burst_ out from its body.

Twilight barely had time to turn and put himself between the Leviathan and Legend before he was hit by the hardest invisible stone wall he’d ever run afoul of, and everything went dark. When he came to his senses, he was prostrate on the ground, his vision dim and his ears ringing. Fluid of some kind trailed from his nose, down his cheeks and chin, and he could taste copper. The stone he lay on punched him in the chest. He lifted his head and barely made out the sight of Legend flattened on his back, unmoving and eyes closed. The rancher lifted his hand and tried to reach him. Tried to check on him. Tried to help him.

“Ve…teran,” he croaked, his voice barely a whisper. He hardly noticed the next punch from the earth as his face fell to the ground, and the world went dark for good.

* * *

With a flash of green magic, three Heroes of Courage appeared on the main bridge to Zora’s Domain. What had been a fog of fear and uncertainty when they’d left was now a firestorm of panic. People ran about the plazas and mezzanines, screaming and calling for their loved ones. The ground trembled, and a wave of screams rose like a wave crashing over a rock.

Somewhere in the recesses of Time’s mind, a phantom echo of clock tower bells insisted on ensuring he would not forget his deadline.

“Get up to the bridges,” he told Hyrule and Four, “help whoever you can! _Go!”_ The three heroes pushed into the crowd, the younger two making their way towards a nearby staircase. Time pressed into the panicked mob in the lower plaza and grabbed the first person in reach, a Hylian man. “Get upstairs!!” he yelled. “You _have_ to get to the bridges!!”

“The bridges are hopeless!” the man yelled back, a wild look in his eye that Time had seen in many a panicked horse. “One leads to a dead-end, the other to a death-trap of a wall! There’s nowhere to go but the main bridge, and that leads right toward—”

A cacophony of explosions rang out in the canyon, drawing everyone’s eyes to a light show that illuminated the shadow of something truly _massive._ The roar that accompanied the display only served to spill oil on the flames of panic. Time was shoved about, armor and all, by Hylians, gerudo, and zora alike, all running about and screaming. He pushed his way out of the current and found himself toppling onto the base of the statue in the plaza’s center, the statue of the champion’s fallen friend. It held his weight as he regained his footing and looked about, the phantom bells ringing in his ears even when the explosions in the canyon ceased.

The ground trembled again. Time’s gaze fell on a group of gorons sitting in the entrance to the general store. They made no effort to leave their place. Time pushed off from the statue and made his way toward them. A flash of light from the canyon briefly brightened the world, and the Domain trembled again with a sound like thunder. Another wave of screams swelled up around him, but they did nothing to drown out the phantom bells.

Time finally stumbled before the gorons and said, “Brothers! You need to get to the upper levels, you can make it over the bridges!”

The goron sitting at the front of the group blinked at him, startled, before smiling at him. “Nah, we’re too big, Brother. We’d block up traffic, get people stuck. If stayin’ out of the way means a few other people make it out, then we’re fine here.” The others behind him nodded and voiced their solidarity with this assessment.

A wave of screams, louder than any Time had ever heard in his life, made him turn to the canyon. A billowing, doomsday cloud of dust and smoke rolled around the bend of the canyon, and from it emerged the Leviathan. It’s cragged maw opened and spilled out a roaring challenge that shook the canyon walls. The sight acted like a force field, driving the mob of people towards the back of the plaza. Time turned back to the gorons and was only met with a smile. “Go on, Brother,” the goron in front said, “there’s other people who need you.”

Time held the goron’s gaze for another moment, his eyes burning and bells clamoring in his ears, before he turned and grabbed the first person he could get his hands on. “You have to get to the upper bridges!” he yelled as he pushed them towards the nearest stairway. _“The upper bridges!”_

He darted through the crowd, pushing people towards the stairs. A voice rang out over a megaphone, crying, _“Do not jump!! The current below is too strong,_ **_the current is too strong!!”_ **

Time looked to the railings at the front of the plaza and saw Hylians and gerudo stepping off the edge and disappearing from sight. His heart seized when his eye fell on the face of a child screaming over the shoulder of his mother before she, too, stepped off and they both fell from sight. The hero felt his bones freeze and a pit—the likes of which he’d never felt before—open in his stomach. A rito descended from the air over the railing and hovered in place. 

“Hold on!” he yelled, “I can take someone! Just give me a place to—” A Hylian man leapt up and grabbed the rito’s leg, eliciting a squawk from the winged fellow. The rito tried to say something, “Argh, no, wait, I need to—” but more and more people leapt up, grasping onto him for help, and Time felt the pit in his stomach widen as he watched them all fall into the darkness below.

Another roar from the Leviathan drew Time's eye to it, and he saw that the beast had nearly reached the mesa at the other end of the main bridge. He stared at the monster, his ears full of screaming and clanging bells, and a cold blanket finally settled over his heart. His eye clouded over and his mouth melted into a thin frown as Time calmly walked towards the main bridge, reaching into his bottomless pouch.

Into his collection of masks.

* * *

Wild awoke to pain. A _whole_ _lot_ of pain. Groaning, he cracked his eyes open and experimented with moving his appendages. Fingers, toes, hands and feet, arms and legs, they all flexed on command and sent burning trails of pain throughout his body. He rolled over onto his stomach and felt a horizontal line of hot agony across his spine, like an open wound from a kodachi. Whatever the injury was, it sprouted lines and veins and roots of electric wires that stretched down his legs and met in the soles of his feet, all burning and pulsing in time with his heart. He pulled his knees up to the floor underneath him and pushed himself up to sit on his heels. His pained moans echoed off the stone walls of the MCU’s hall.

His mind ground to a halt when it tried to make sense of why Vah Ruta’s interior was now sideways when that was Vah _Rudania’s_ mechanical ability. But the fog cleared with a shake of his head, and Wild looked around for his friend. “Sidon?”

He turned around, his body screaming in protest, and found the zora lying several feet away, quiet and unmoving. He started and grimaced at the flare of pain the sudden movement triggered. Opening his bottomless pouch, he withdrew a glass bottle filled with a red potion from one of his comrades’ time periods. He couldn’t remember whose, but he hoped it was one of the more potent formulas. Uncorking the bottle was more of a struggle than it should’ve been, but it finally _popped_ out and let him take a healthy swig. 

Fortunately, he felt the effects within seconds, the pain dulling to distant aches. _Un_ fortunately, the pain _only_ dulled to distant aches. Wild wiped his mouth with his sleeve before crawling over to Sidon and lifting the zora’s head onto his lap. Tilting Sidon’s chin, he tried to tip the potion into the prince’s mouth with as little spillage as he could manage. After a moment, Sidon started away, coughing and sputtering as he rolled over onto his elbows and knees. Wild returned his bottle to his pouch and pulled up his Sheikah Slate.

“Link?” Sidon asked between wheezes. “Where are we?”

“Ask me in another minute,” Wild groaned as he tapped a few commands on his slate’s screen. They both began to glow blue, then unravelled and drifted away on the air. After they rematerialized on a Sheikah Shrine under the open sky, Sidon gasped and coughed some more.

“Wha— What was that?” he wheezed as Wild pushed himself to his feet and stumbled over to him. “Did we jus— Did we just teleport?”

“Yep,” Wild answered as he knelt down and wrapped his arms around Sidon’s waist. He sucked in a breath and _heaved_ the zora prince to his feet with a grunt. The pain in his back and his legs and his everything revved up like the engine of the Master Cycle, and he grit through his teeth, “Careful, we’re goin’ downhill.”

He led the prince down the slope, carrying most of his weight. They stumbled down a path that curved past an apple tree. Sidon saw the village of angular, thatched roofs in the valley below and couldn’t stop himself from asking, “Link, where are we?”

“Kakariko Village,” Wild grunted. Sidon started to struggle against him, but the champion continued to lead him down the path.

“No, no wait we— We have to go back! We still— We still need to help—”

“I _am_ going back.”

“No, _we’re_ going back, I still—”

“You’re staying here. You’re hurt.”

“ _You’re_ hurt, too!”

At the base of the path, as Wild turned them about to enter the village proper, two men in Sheikah clothing approached up the thoroughfare. “Link?” one asked.

“Dorian, Cado! Get him to a healer!” Wild instructed over Sidon’s protests. The two guards started and surged forward to take the zora prince, who reached a trembling hand out to his friend.

“No, _please,_ Link, I _made a promise!”_

“You’ve done everything you can, Sidon!” Wild called out as he backed away, already tapping at the slate in his hand. Sidon could only watch helplessly as the hero was whisked away in strands of light.

* * *

When Wild rematerialized in the shrine chamber in Zora’s Domain, the ground quaked beneath his feet. The chamber was filled with terrified zora huddling for shelter, many muttering prayers. The echoes of panic from outside rebounded off of the coral walls. Wild sucked in a breath and pushed himself forward and up the stairs, stumbling whenever another of the Leviathan’s footsteps shook the earth. He pushed through the remnants of the panicked crowd and braced himself against the base of Mipha’s statue, just to catch his breath. He looked towards the canyon, towards the beast—and saw the unmistakable figure of Time walking towards the main bridge, alone.

“Old Man!” Wild groaned, pushing himself off the statue-base and stumbling towards the bridge. _“Old Man!!”_ he managed to cry before he fell to his hands and knees, just short of the staircases to the upper levels. Time whirled around, his eye widening at the sight before him. 

_“Champion!”_ He sprinted back to Wild’s side, dropping to his knees, and grabbing the champion’s shoulders. “Are you hurt?”

Wild vehemently shook his head and grit out, “I have to stop it.”

Time cast a glance toward the approaching beast before looking back to the younger hero. “We _can’t,_ Champion, we have to focus on getti—”

“Cook!! Old Man!!” an even _younger_ hero’s voice cried out before Wind appeared by their side.

 _“Sailor?!_ What are you—” Time shook his head and turned back to Wild. “You need to use your slate to warp as many people as you can out of here _right now!!”_

 _“I have to stop it,”_ Wild barked.

_“There is no-thing we can do!”_

_“Guys!!!”_ Wind yelled, and the other two heroes followed his gaze.

The Leviathan had halted its advance beside the towering island at the far end of the main bridge. It raised its jaws to the sky and let out a thunderous roar as brilliant blue light began to reflect off of the coral in the canyon’s walls. Both of Time’s eyes widened before he threw his arms around the other two heroes and pulled them to his chest.

A diamond-shaped barrier of blue magic encased them less than half a second before they were _engulfed_ in the shaft of destructive light.

They _screamed._ They _all_ screamed, because the beam was so _bright,_ so _loud._ They screamed because they thought the world was ending around them. They screamed because they were staring into a bright, white-blue sun despite the fact their eyes were screwed shut. They screamed because their bones shook from the unending roll of thunder in their ears. They barely noticed when the coral beneath them shifted—and then suddenly, they were falling.

Wild felt the old man’s arms fall away, and then he was tumbling downward, the world spinning around him. Everything was pitch black, save for the beam of light that would flash through his vision with each spin. Then he _slammed_ into the water, and his airways _burned._ He thrashed about, the current pulling him along. The beam ceased firing above for a moment, casting him in total darkness. Fear started to close its claws around his heart and his throat until the beam fired again and gave him some orientation. 

Wild swam towards the light, pushing himself upward until he _finally_ broke through the surface, spewing water from his nose and mouth. Coughing and hacking, he’d barely caught his breath when a large slab of coral fell from above and landed nearby, sending a wave that plunged him back under the surface. Again, he was lost in pitch blackness until the beam resumed firing above. He swam up and broke the surface again, coughing, sputtering, and flailing about. A small arm suddenly reached around his chest from behind him and squeezed.

“I got ya, Cook!” Wind yelled, swimming along with one hand and pulling Wild with the other. Wild sputtered and scrambled about for his bearings. Around him, Hylians and gerudo thrashed about the water, some screaming for help, others for their loved ones. Some screamed for the gods, others for the hero. Some tried to hold onto each other, even if it meant forcing someone under. Coral debris fell from above in pieces big and small, turning the lake beneath the sculpted city into a churning pot. Wild finally found his grip on the situation and turned about, wrapping one arm around Wind’s back and stroking the water with the other. The two swam for their lives together amidst the tempest of thrashing bodies, falling rubble, and piercing screams, all while the sky was ripped asunder by the cacophony of destruction above.

They reached one of the stone islets that held the support structures for the Domain and clambered ashore. Wild dropped on his side, his breathing labored and his face mere inches from the waves lapping at the edge of the stone. Wind pulled himself up to his knees and looked across the horrifying sight before him.

“Old Man!!” he yelled. He looked and looked but did not find what he sought. _“Old Maaaan!!!”_

He dove back into the water, and Wild was left alone with his pain. He took in a seething breath and opened his eyes to find a misshapen rock pressed against the waterline by the waves before him. As he stared at it, he realized that it was not stone. It was coral.

One of Mipha’s eyes stared back at him.

The timorous racket faded from Wild’s ears. The light vanished from his peripheral vision, as did the waves. All he saw was Mipha’s eye, and all he heard was the simple question it asked him.

_Why had he failed them again?_

_Why had he failed her again?_

_Why?_

Something bumped Wild’s head, and he looked up to see Wind settling back onto his knees.

“I can’t find the Old Man!!” he yelled over the din as Wild pulled himself up to mirror the sailor. “Did you see where he— _agh!!”_

Wind clutched his head, where the falling rock had struck it, and looked up. Wild mirrored him again, and both pairs of eyes widened when they saw the massive cracks growing in the coral structure above them.

 _“GET US OUT OF HERE COOK!!!”_ Wind screamed at Wild’s face, the champion already frantically tapping at the screen. _“NOW NOW NOW NOW—”_

Wild threw his arms around Wind, and they both turned blue and unravelled into threads only a second before the coral structure came down on their islet.

* * *

The glowing threads of blue light coalesced into the shapes of Wild and Wind at the Dagah Keek Shrine. The sounds of Zora’s Domain’s destruction clawed at their hearts from behind them. Wild pushed himself to his feet, lighting blasting down his legs from the magma trench in his lower back, and stumbled from the shrine to the nearest vantage point.

He stood on a large, smooth outcropping of coral at the edge of a cliff. Behind him was the faint droning of the Veiled Falls. Before him was what remained of the massive superstructure of Zora’s Domain, carved to pieces before his eyes by a bright, blue beam of energy with a destructive power he’d never seen before. He watched, his heart shearing apart, as the fish-shaped tower that marked the throne room was severed by the beam, toppling over and plummeting to the lake below.

_“I’ve lived here my entire life,” Mipha says, “and I always find my breath stolen from me by this sight.”_

Wild choked. The sound of so, _so_ many screams rose up from the water before they were silenced by the tower landing with a deep **_bwoosh._ ** He could make out the shapes of bodies—how many living and how many dead, he would never know—falling down the waterfall into Ruto Lake before they were carried off down the river by the current. 

_Bolson lets out another sigh, turns to Wild with that lost look in his eye, and shrugs. When his words finally come, they sound like a plea for answers. “We never saw this coming.”_

_Why did you fail them again?_

A smell reached his nose, one he’d never encountered before, and the only conclusion his mind could reach was that he was smelling the _air_ being cooked by the bright, blue beam.

_“I’ve lived here my entire life,” Mipha says._

_Why did you fail me again?_

Wild choked. The ground rumbled beneath his feet, and everything left in the world that had marked the life of his dearest friend was wiped away before his eyes by the bright, blue beam.

_A piece of metal barely peeks out from a nest of broken wood and stone. It was no simple iron or steel. It was peerless silver and ruby—bent, twisted. Warped, malformed. Broken._

_Why?_

He stared, his body aflame with pain, his chest collapsing from the crushing weight of his failure, his mind forever seared with the image of the bright, blue beam—

With a sudden _snap_ of clarity, Wild had an idea. He turned back to the shrine and pointed to Wind. “Stay there, Sailor!”

“But—”

 _“Stay there!”_ Wild reiterated, already running along the cliff’s edge. He pushed against the roaring fire in his back and the electric claws dragging down his legs. He ran and skipped and jumped along the outcroppings of coral and stone, each step sending shockwaves of pain throughout his body, until he reached the outcropping that brought him the highest and the closest to the Leviathan’s head. He’d been right, Ruto Lake had indeed reduced the beast’s height advantage. Now, drawing his bow and knocking three ancient arrows, he had a clear shot at the side of the thing’s head—at the side of one of its eyes.

_thwock_

**_psheeEEWW_ **

The Leviathan’s head was, for a moment, obscure by three small, blue explosions. Its beam disappeared and it roared before it caught another ancient arrow to its face, and then another and another. It turned at last to face the cliffside, and its eyes _finally_ settled on Wild, who stashed away his bow and drew his shield with a purposeful grimace.

His timing had to be perfect.

Wild, eyes manic, muttered, “Come on, I want ya to do it I want ya to _do_ it, I want ya to _give it_ to me, I want ya to _gimmeallyagot.”_ His heart hammered in his chest, his pulse raced in his ears, and the molten gash burning across his lower spine spilled agony down to his heels and toes. 

His timing had to be _perfect._

The Leviathan _roared._ Its breath blew his hair back and pushed against him like a hot, rancid wind. The canyon wall behind it began to glimmer with a brilliant, blue glow.

His timing _had. To be._ **_Perfect._ **

The Leviathan opened its mouth, leaned forward—and stopped short. The blue glow behind it disappeared, and the beast was enveloped in a soft, white light that shimmered with shades of purples, golds, and greens. It blinked, its head looking about as if searching for something—as if it were _confused._ It let out...not a roar, but...a bark? A _yelp?_ It looked about, shimmering and glowing, before it raised its head to the heavens and roared as it suddenly became translucent, and then gradually, its body and call faded and faded until the Leviathan vanished completely.

Wild’s mind ground to a halt. He stood, rooted in place like a statue, his mouth ajar and his eyes wide. 

“Wh…. Wh— Wha—” A sound made him whirl around and find Wind, his eyes wide an his mouth hanging open. The champion only looked at him for a moment before he asked, “What the fuck was that?” He didn’t wait for an answer, his burning gaze snapping back to where the beast had been before immediately returning to the sailor. “What the fuck was _that?!”_ He spun back again, as if trying to catch sight of the monster peeking around a corner, before turning back to Wind and roaring, _“WHAT THE FUCK WAS THAT??!!”_

With a yell, he spun back around and hurled his shield with a discus throw, sending it twirling through the air toward the empty space the beast had occupied only moments ago. _“Get BACK HERE!!”_ he screamed. _“YOU DON’T GET TO JUST…!!_ YOU CAN’T…!! You….” Wild deflated, his shoulders slumping and the fire in his eyes smothered by a look one could only call… _lost._ When his words came again, they sounded like a plea. “I, I need to…. I have to—”

A long _CCCCCRACK_ drew his eyes back to what was left of the superstructure of Zora’s Domain. Another large piece of the coral sculpture broke away and fell into the drink below, and the sound of its impact with the water drowned out the swell of screaming that arose with it.

A low, keening noise began to swell up from Wild’s throat. His eyes fell away from the crumbling sculpture and he fell to his knees. The moan grew louder, and louder, and louder until his head fell back and he let loose a pained howl, a wail—a terrible sound that rose into the air and was carried away on the wind like so much dust.


	10. Recovery Efforts

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content Warnings: depiction of unhealthy coping mechanisms and dismissal of mental health concerns, implied allusion to the threat of being eaten alive by wildlife.

The first thing Legend became aware of, as he awoke, was the sheer _weight_ of his body. His bones and every inch of sinew and meat encasing them felt as if they were made of lead and cast iron. Next, he became aware of the fabric that cocooned everything below his shoulders, as well as the soft padding beneath him. A bedroll, no doubt. Finally, he became aware of two men’s voices speaking to his left. They were close enough for him to easily understand them, were he more awake, but he was not, so he could not. With a greater deal of effort than the act should require, he pulled his eyelids apart and blinked the blurriness from his vision. He was met with the sight of a thatched roof high above him. With a slow, mighty _heave,_ he turned his head in the voices’ direction.

Just a few feet away, two of his fellow heroes sat on the floor facing each other. One sat on another bedroll tucked into the corner of the room, leaning his back against a small bookcase. The other sat with his back towards Legend. The veteran had a hard time distinguishing them, at first—neither wore their tunics or distinctive outer layers, and they each had dark hair. When the fog sufficiently cleared from his mind, he was finally able to see that the one leaning against the bookcase was Twilight. His mind connected these dots mere seconds before the rancher’s attention suddenly snapped to him.

“Veteran?” Twilight asked, pulling himself away from the bookcase with some noticeable effort. The other hero twisted around, his eyes widening when they met Legend’s.

“You’re awake!” Sky said with a smile. Without waiting even a second for a response, he rose to his feet, revealing a sling holding his right arm to his chest. “I’ll go get Miss Nanna.”

Legend barely registered his words before the Chosen Hero was gone, leaving him alone with the rancher. He hefted another blink and croaked out, “Where are we?”

“Kakariko Village. Impa’s upstairs room.”

Another heavy blink. “The champion’s time?”

Twilight nodded. Legend let his eyes fall closed and left them so. After a moment of searching through the last of the fog in his mind, he finally asked, “What happened?”

On the other side of the room, the rancher’s eyes fell to the floor between himself and the veteran. “Zora’s Domain is gone.”

Legend let out a sigh as heavy as his eyelids. “And the Leviathan?”

There was a long pause—one which Legend would’ve recognized as heavy, were he in a better state of mind. Finally, Twilight only said, “It’s gone, too.”

“Any idea where it’s,” Legend took a breath, “going?”

Another long pause, then: “It’s _gone,_ Veteran.”

That made Legend heft his eyes open again. “What?”

Twilight shook his head and shrugged. “It just… _vanished._ The sailor, the captain, a whole slew of witnesses…they all say it just started glowing all kinds of different colors and then just…disappeared.” The last word fell from his mouth to the floor with the weight of a paper crane. Legend stared at him for a moment, unsure if he had heard correctly or if he were lost in his mind-fog again. He finally let his eyes close again and _heaved_ his head over to face the ceiling again.

“You’ve gotta be _shitting_ me,” he grumbled. Twilight didn’t have a response to that. After another silence, the veteran croaked out, “The others?”

Twilight looked up from the floor, his frown flattening out. “They’re okay. Some are bruised and banged up, but they’re all in one piece. You’re the worst off of us all.”

As if answering a cue, the sound of footsteps echoed from the stairwell and Sky entered with Nanna close behind. The Sheikah woman sat beside Legend and put him through a simple examination that made the veteran eager to return to sleep. When she finally finished, she patted his chest with a smile.

“You’re in need of rest,” she said, “a _lot_ of it.” Standing to her feet, she added, “We’ll bring you elixirs to help the process, but they’ll only do so much. Sleep will do the rest.”

With that, she left, and the room was quiet until Legend croaked out, “Sky?”

“I’m here,” the Chosen Hero said, his steps approaching until he dropped down to sit beside Legend’s bedroll. 

The veteran’s head tilted towards him, eyes cracking open. “What happened to you?” 

Sky’s lips pursed and his shoulders slouched. ”When I fell, my sailcloth saved me. Again. But right as I was about to land on solid ground, the Leviathan’s tail passed by, close enough to blow me off course with an updraft. I hit the canyon wall pretty hard and landed wrong. I probably made it worse when….” His eyes fell. “People started floating by in the river. Most of them were trying to swim to the shore, but the current was too strong for them to reach—so I dove in to help, but the current pulled _me_ away, too, and I ended up struggling to keep myself and another man above the water until the river emptied out into the wetlands. Then I just kept swimming in and out to pull as many people ashore as I could. I couldn’t help them all, but….” He lowered his head with a frown before he quietly said, “I helped who I could.”

Legend hefted another blink before finally letting his head fall to the side so that he could see Twilight again. “And the rest?”

“Almost everyone else got off without a scratch,” the rancher said. “Except for the champion.”

Even in his current state, Legend felt the air change in the room. “What happened to ‘im?”

“He was really banged up. Needed a lot of potions and elixirs. His body’s fine now, mostly, but….”

“He’s…not taking the outcome very well,” Sky finished.

Legend wanted to nod, but his head just felt too heavy, so he gave a grunt instead. “How long’s it been?”

“Two days.”

“We were starting to get worried about you,” Twilight added.

Legend grunted again, his eyes falling closed quite easily. “Well, sorry ta disappoint ya…but I’m gonna…go back ta sleep….”

Sky said something in reply, but Legend only heard the faintest echo of his voice before finally succumbing to slumber’s embrace.

* * *

Passing through the door of the Shuteye Inn, Hyrule couldn’t deny the feeling of relief that seeped into his skin with the sunlight and the breeze, even if his breathing was more labored than was typical. He pulled the glass bottle of stamina elixir from his belt and yanked the cork free before downing the last two swallows at the bottom. It didn’t quite rejuvenate as well as a green potion, but it was what he had, and he’d done his best to ration it over the course of the day. They could only make so much at a time. Returning the bottle to his belt, he cast a look about Kakariko’s village square.

The small town, normally quiet and peaceful, was filled to _bursting_ with refugees. Rows and rows of tents and cots had been erected, but now, four days after the beast’s attack, most of the tents dedicated to the wounded had been disassembled. Only two medical tents remained, with healers coming and going regularly. The most skilled of them were focused on the village’s inn, however, where the most grievously wounded were housed. Hyrule still wasn’t sure how _he_ was considered qualified enough to help them, but no one had died under his care.

Yet.

He felt the stamina elixir taking effect, the tightness in his chest dissipating and his breathing coming much easier, but his train of thought left a heavy stone that didn’t fade in the slightest. Letting out a heavy sigh, he turned to step down from the porch and started when he nearly bumped into Time, his armor and gambeson absent and a bowl of soup in each hand.

“Hello, Traveler,” the old man said as he offered a bowl towards him.

“Hi,” Hyrule said with a relieved breath. “Thanks, but I’m not hungry.”

Time only fixed him with a pointed look, his eyebrows raised. “Yes you are.”

Hyrule looked from the older hero’s face to the bowl and back again. When he found no sign of backing down, he finally took it from the old man and let himself be led by a hand at his back towards the picnic tables by the river. The patio was unusually empty, with only two people seated: a zora man eating alone, and a Hylian woman reading a book. The heroes sat at an empty table, and Hyrule sighed before ferrying a spoonful of soup from the bowl to his mouth with little enthusiasm. Once the stew had time to settle on his tongue, however, he felt a gaping void suddenly open in his gut and demand _more._ He brought his head down to his bowl and shoveled more into his trap with the urgency of bailing water out of a sinking boat. He was a third of the way through his serving when he saw the smirk on Time’s face. Hyule stuck his tongue out at the old man and dove back into the stew.

They ate in companionable silence for a few minutes before Warriors appeared at Time’s side, equally dressed-down, with a bowl of his own in his hands. He placed it on the table with a scowl on his face and dropped into his seat with a frustrated breath. The sight immediately put Hyrule on edge, and he couldn’t help but look to the old man for guidance. Time examined the new arrival for a moment before greeting him with a simple, “Captain.”

“Old Man,” was the curt reply he got before Warriors practically threw a spoonful of his stew into his mouth. When it became apparent that answer was all he was getting, Time looked down to his own soup and readied a spoonful.

“Something troubling you?” he asked before taking a sip. Warriors somehow managed to swallow loudly enough for Hyrule to hear from the opposite side of the table.

 _“Whispers_ and _gossip,”_ the captain said, spitting the words as if they were curses. _“Slander_ against the crown.”

“Slander?” Hyrule asked. He barely restrained himself from flinching back at the heat in Warriors’s gaze when it turned to him.

“Some people have started connecting the dots,” he said, “deducing that the princess’s machine is what drew the Leviathan to Zora’s Domain.”

“That was inevitable,” Time said.

“Yes, and with these deductions comes doubts and questioning—whether the princess is competent enough to head the reconstruction efforts, competent enough to rule. But now, someone’s had the _gall_ to suggest that she drew the monster there _intentionally.”_

 _“What?”_ Hyrule balked.

Warriors nodded, his scowl screwing even tighter. “I had some choice words for him, but he won’t be the last to reach such a conclusion. And if their voices rise too loudly, they might spread their nonsense like a virus.” The captain shook his head and looked down into his bowl, briskly stirring its contents as he muttered, “Perhaps the champion can talk some sense into them when he finally comes down from _brooding.”_

Time’s gaze whipped to Warriors with a glare that chilled Hyrule’s blood. _“Captain.”_

Warriors met Time’s eye and recoiled at the sight. Hyrule saw what might have been a light of realization spark in his eyes before his face wilted, his gaze falling to his soup in clear shame. “You’re right,” the captain murmured. “That was unfair. I’m sorry.”

Time blew a long breath through his nose before turning back to his own soup, and an uneasy silence fell over the table. Hyrule’s eyes couldn’t help but drift up to the hilltop that overlooked the village from the north. There, he’d been told, one could find a Sheikah Shrine, the path to a great fairy fountain, and an excellent view of the Lanayru Wetlands—and the mountain range that had housed Zora’s Domain.

“Do either of you know what we can do?” he asked his friends. “To help him?”

Warriors shook his head. “I’m not very well versed in maladies of the spirit—clearly.” He couldn’t help but grimace on the last word.

Time’s eye was distant, seeing something through the table. When he finally looked to the traveler, he only murmured, “I wish I did.”

The sound of light footsteps heralded the arrival of Four and Wind. _“Whoo,_ boy,” the sailor said as he set his bowl beside Warriors’s and took the accompanying seat. “Those kids are really serious about hide and seek!”

“Haven’t tired you out yet, have they?” Four asked as he took the empty spot beside Hyrule.

“Not a bit,” Wind replied, shaking his head and smiling before slurping some broth from his spoon.

Four pointed his own spoon toward Hyrule’s bowl and asked, “How is it?” His answer came immediately in the form of the traveler’s stomach demanding attention with _more_ than enough gusto to be heard by the other heroes. They all froze, their eyes fixed on him, until the captain let out a snort.

“It seems you’re in need of a second helping, my friend,” he said, struggling and failing to refrain from grinning.

“You’ve more than earned it. You’d better hurry before it’s gone,” Time added with much more restraint, the corners of his mouth curled up.

Hyrule’s stomach audibly agreed to this suggestion, much to the others’ amusement, and he didn’t need much more prodding than that.

* * *

Sidon needed to move quickly. The previous four days had been spent under the _inescapable_ supervision of his Royal Guard—what was left of it, that is. He’d tried to order them to leave him be so that he may attend to a personal matter, but they’d refused. He’d been floored at first. He certainly hadn’t expected them to reject a command from the King of the Zora.

Then again, he understood the need to make up for past failings.

And that was why he needed some time alone, time he’d finally gotten thanks to a useful distraction from Princess Zelda and her small scientists. But the distraction wouldn’t last forever, and he couldn’t exactly move inconspicuously. His size made him stand out enough as it was, let alone his newfound station.

From the stairway leading up to Impa’s front door, he made his way to the tent where food was prepared and served. If the other heroes were anything like Link, they couldn’t resist the pull of a meal. Even if he couldn’t find one there, he might find someone who could point him in the right—

A figure clad in green and brown, approaching the line that stretched out of the food tent, caught his attention. Sidon altered his path towards the Hylian and said, “Hello, Hero!”

The traveler gave a double-take at the zora and then bowed. _“Oh,_ uh, hello, Your Majesty,” he stammered.

Sidon had been called _Your Majesty_ his entire life, of course. He was— _had been_ the Prince of the Zora. But ever since the morning after the Leviathan’s attack, those words weighed on his shoulders like a heavy coat he hadn’t become the least bit accustomed to. They poked at his chest with sharp ends. Pushing those sensations aside, he smiled and said, “Oh, there’s no need for formalities, please stand. And thank you, again, for everything you and your friends did to help us. We are eternally in your gratitude. But tell me, do you know where I might be able to find Link?”

Hyrule straightened upright, an uneasy frown on his face, before pointing upwards into the distance, first with his eyes and then with his index finger. “Up near the Sheikah Shrine, sir. He barely ever comes down.”

“I see,” the zora mused, his smile shrinking as his gaze followed the traveler’s. He looked back to Hyrule and said, “Thank you. Take care, and if you’re _ever_ in need of something, don’t hesitate to ask. We’ll help however we can.”

He turned and started towards the path to the hilltop, leaving Hyrule behind to frown and glance at the tents and refugees crammed into the small village. Sidon made his way up the trail that Wild had dragged him down and went over the words he wanted to say again. He’d been going over them all morning, but one more time certainly couldn’t hurt. Another time after that couldn’t hurt either. He was going over the words a fourth time when he finally reached the hilltop and froze in his tracks.

There Wild sat, his black cloak fastened around his shoulders and his hood pulled up over his head. Before him was the great expanse of the Lanayru Wetlands, and in the distance one could clearly see the carcass of Vah Ruta, unmoved since it’d fallen. Further beyond it, Vah Medoh hovered high in the sky, orbiting around the mountain range where Zora’s Domain had been nested.

Hanging over that mountain range was a cloud of dust and smoke. It had been much thicker, four days ago, but it still had days to go before it would disperse entirely. Until then, it hung like a stain in the sky. A black mark on the record of many souls. Sidon couldn’t help but stare at it, his mind itching as memories writhed about likes swarming bugs. He finally pushed them aside and walked over to his friend, dropping down to sit beside him.

“Hello, Link,” he said. After several seconds of silence, he continued. “I’m sorry I haven’t come to see you since…um…. I wanted to talk with you. Alone. But my guards wouldn’t leave me be. And I’ve had a lot to deal with and think about, and…. I’m sorry, this is all coming out very, uh…very….” A heavy sigh fell from his lips. After another long silence, before he even knew what was going to come out, he said, “I was hurt, when you left me here. Angry. _Furious,_ even. I didn’t even think I _could_ get angry, but…I’ve thought about that night for the past four days and…I realized that…you were right. I had done _everything_ I could do.” Sidon turned to his friend. “And I hope you don’t blame yourself for this, Link, because _you_ did everything _you_ could, too.”

Wild remained still and quiet. Sidon looked away, his gaze drawn to that black stain again. He was about to speak again when Wild finally breathed, “And it wasn’t enough. Again.”

Sidon turned to the champion. “What?”

“I did everything I could, and it wasn’t enough to stop that thing. Like I couldn’t stop the Calamity.”

The zora king turned back to Wild with a frown. “You _did_ stop the Calamity, Link.”

“On my _second try,”_ Wild barked back. His head lowered under his hood. “None of the others needed one of those. One of them has even beaten Ganon _more_ than once.” After a pause, he whispered, “Some hero I am.”

The words left Sidon’s mouth before he even knew what he was saying: “They couldn’t stop it either.”

He didn’t miss the way Wild’s shoulders tensed before the hero’s head slowly turned toward him. “What?”

“The Leviathan. The other heroes couldn’t stop it either. But you tried. You _all_ tried. The Hero of Time told me that you were trying to stop it when you couldn’t even _stand._ You’re no less of a hero than them, Link. It just….” Sidon held his breath in his chest, scrambling to find the words in his mind to give shape to the point in his heart. When he came up empty handed, he finally let it out with a heavy sigh. But then another thought appeared, and it made him stand, turn to his friend, and say, “Come on.”

Wild barely had a chance to look up before the zora king wrapped a hand around each of his arms and pulled him up to his feet. He stumbled at the unexpected change but found his footing as Sidon dragged him back towards the path by an arm, leading him away from the ledge overlooking the wetlands to the ledge overlooking the village.

“Do you see those people, Link?” Sidon asked, his finger pointing out and scanning over the throngs of refugees, cots, and tents that filled the village. “They escaped because we bought them time. We didn’t get as much time as we wanted, but we got enough to save _them._ Down there are parents who still have their children, and brothers who still have their sisters, and lovers who still have each other, and….”

Sidon dropped to a knee and placed a hand on Wild’s shoulder, his eyes boring into the side of the champion’s hood. “We couldn’t save them all, and I’d give my _life_ to save even just a few more, but…. We can’t _drown ourselves_ with the weight of those we’ve lost. Mipha…my father….”

His eyes fell to the ground, his throat constricting around his wet voice. After a few deep breaths, he looked up again and said, “Each and every person down there, every life we saved, is a _victory,_ Link. _They_ can live on. _Their lives_ will go on, and they have the chance to feel happiness and joy again someday, and _you gave them that chance._ You…. You just—”

“We don’t know why it came here or where it went,” Wild said, his voice so quiet that Sidon almost didn’t hear him. Then, quieter still: “What if it comes back?”

Sidon stared at him with a frown before he simply asked, “Would you abandon us to it?”

Wild immediately whirled around to face Sidon, his eyes wide. _“No!”_

Sidon grasped both of Wild’s shoulders in his hands and gave the hero a small shake. _“Exactly!_ _That_ is why you are a hero! We couldn’t stop the Leviathan before and we might not be able to stop it again—it might as well be a typhoon, or a plague.” Wild pulled away from Sidon’s grasp and looked back out over the village below, but Sidon pressed on. “But we can still _help._ And I am eternally _grateful_ for your help. _Thank you,_ Link, for helping me, and for helping these people.”

Wild was quiet for a long while. Finally, he said, “I think your guard’s looking for you.”

Sidon looked down into the village and saw zora guards scurrying about the village, checking in tents and stopping passers-by no doubt to question them. At the sound of footsteps, he turned to see Wild returning back to his place overlooking the wetlands, a faint limp in his right leg. The king watched the champion lower himself back into the spot he’d found him in before letting out a sigh. His heart was heavy as he stood, then started making his way back to the village to stop his guard from tearing the place apart.

* * *

The next morning, Legend shuffled out of Impa’s front door in his under-tunic and paused on the porch, letting his eyes adjust to the sunlight. When he could comfortably see again, he slowly picked his way down the staircase to the village square and took slow, careful steps towards the big tent from which the many wonderful smells of food were wafting. Inside, he made his way toward the back, where numerous people of numerous races crowded around numerous pots and pans over numerous cooking fires. Smoke rose from each fire and fled through numerous openings in the tent’s roof.

After some questioning, Legend was given a small cauldron and directed toward an unused fire. As he approached it, his eyes fell on the cook manning the station at the next fire over.

“Hey,” Legend said to Wild as he set his cauldron in place over the fire.

“Hey,” Wild replied, looking up from the soup he was dumping carrot slices into. “How are you?”

Legend shrugged and tilted his head, which elicited an audible _pop_ from the base of his neck and a small moan. “Been better,” he groaned as he slowly lowered himself onto a small stool beside the fire. Pulling ingredients from his bottomless pouch, he nodded his chin toward the champion and asked, “You?”

Wild mirrored the veteran’s shrug and head-tilt. “Been better.” He watched Legend pull out a mortar-and-pestle and asked, “Making green potions?”

Legend nodded again, this time in affirmation. “Rest and food’ll have me back on my feet in a week or so. Rest, food, and green potion’ll get me up even faster. B’sides, who knows when we’ll need more of it.” Wild nodded and went back to his stew. After breaking up some herbs and sprinkling them into his pestle, Legend asked, “What’chya making?”

“Beef and vegetable stew.”

When Wild said nothing more on the matter, Legend nodded and set to grinding. When the pestle’s contents had been reduced to an appropriately-fine powder, he dumped them into the cauldron. In the corner of his eye, he saw Wild lift his own pot and carry it over to the serving line before returning with another. The veteran watched him set his station up and asked, “What now?”

Wild paused, his brows furrowed. “I dunno, actually.”

Legend uncorked his waterskin and began pouring its contents into his cauldron. “How about something…I dunno, _premium?_ Beef stew’s nice, but….” He finished his thought with a shrug.

Wild stared at his pot for a moment before looking up. “Seafood risotto?”

Legend froze, his eyes wide and locked on Wild’s. “That sounds fucking delicious.”

Wild smirked and let out an amused huff for the first time in what felt like years before he began pulling ingredients from his own pouch.

* * *

The next day, after finishing his morning shift on the cooking line, Wild went looking around the village for Time. He found him seated with some gorons, listening to one tell the group a story about a past encounter with a moblin. After tapping him on the shoulder, Wild asked, “Can I borrow you for a while?”

“Of course,” Time answered, holding his hand out to offer Wild the lead as he stood. Falling into step beside the champion, he asked, “How can I help?”

“The traveler, the veteran, and the healers have replenished most of our healing potions and elixirs,” Wild began, “but I’d feel better if we had some fairy tonics. To make those, I need fairy dust. To get that, I need fairies. To get _those,_ I—”

“You need me,” Time finished with a smirk.

“—need you— Uh, yeah.”

As they crossed the village square and began their trek toward the hillside pathway, Time’s eye fell to Wild’s legs. The champion’s limp had lessened in the days since the Leviathan’s attack—thanks entirely to the last of their health potion reserves, which Time and Warriors had practically had to _force_ down Wild’s throat—but it was still quite pronounced. Looking forward again, he asked, “How have you been feeling?”

Wild could still feel a hot stone sitting in the musculature of his right hip, cold claws in his left knee and calf, long pins in the soles of his feet, and a chunk of steel embedded into his lower spine. But all he said was, “I’m managing.”

Time cast a warning look to the champion and said, “You’re not making things more difficult for yourself, are you?”

Wild had a feeling that Time was throwing him a warning look, so he kept his eyes forward as he answered, “No. But fairy tonics will help.”

Time conceded the point with a hum, and the two heroes continued on in silence. Soon, they were nearing the apple tree that overlooked the village. When they crested onto the hilltop, where the Sheikah Shrine stood, their eyes couldn’t help but be pulled out across the wetlands—toward the great stain in the distant sky.

The champion came to a stop, his gaze fixed on the distant cloud. It was thinner than when Sidon had spoken to Wild, but not by much. From somewhere to his right, Time said, “Champion?”

It took a little effort, but Wild pulled his gaze away and turned it to the old man, whose look held a question in it. He blinked, took a breath, and resumed his course toward the great fairy fountain, Time falling into step beside him again.

The two repeated the trip the next day, after Wild’s cooking shift. Again, the champion’s eyes were pulled to the stain as if by Magnesis. Again, it hung over the horizon. But this time, he was able to pull them away from the sight before Time felt compelled to speak. 

But on their third trip, when he felt the pull again, he only looked ahead to the sparking fountain.

On the day of their fourth trip—nine days after the Leviathan’s attack—Wild and Time were stopped by the sight of what awaited them at the fairy fountain: a swirling, dark vortex that they’d passed through many times before. An hour later, the nine Heroes of Courage, the princess of Hyrule, and one very reliable horse stood near the portal, all decked in their full gear. “I’m sorry to leave you, at a time like this,” Time said to the princess. “We would all stay, if we could, but our task can’t wait any longer.”

“I know,” Zelda said with a small smile. “Thank you for what you _have_ done. There’s still more to do, but you’ve all lightened the load. I wish you all the best of luck, and I hope to see you all again under much lighter circumstances, someday.”

Warriors and Sky—his arm free of the sling and back to full constitution—bowed and said their farewells before marching into the portal. The others bid their own goodbyes as they went, until only Wild, Twilight, Hyrule, and Epona remained. The champion was rooted to his spot before Zelda, his eyes fixed on hers. The traveler waited for his friend, until he felt Twilight’s arm wrap around his shoulder and turn him towards the portal. Together, the two heroes and their faithful steed stepped into the doorway, leaving Wild and Zelda alone. For a while, they only stared at each other while the breeze rattled the trees.

Wild finally broke the silence and asked, “Do you…blame yourself?”

Before he could specify what he meant, she gave a single shake of her head and said, “No. I bear some responsibility, of course, but I did not bring this about intentionally, nor did I ignore any warnings. But it happened, regardless, and now all I can do is treat what was hurt. And I will.”

Wild blinked. “Uh...good.”

"You shouldn't either."

He furrowed his brows. “I don’t blame you.”

“I meant you shouldn’t blame yourself.”

"Oh…. How do you manage it?"

"One of the benefits of seeing through the eyes of the goddess is that it puts some things into perspectives that they should've always been in."

"What if I can't attain that perspective?" Wild asked with a frown.

"Then trust someone who has," Zelda answered with a smile.

Wild’s eyes fell, roaming as if he were reading some invisible text before meeting the princess’s again. “Take care, Zelda.”

“You too, Link. Please.”

* * *

When Wild emerged from the portal, he found himself and his fellow heroes under a clear, blue morning sky and at the fork of an unpaved road. A signpost signified each path’s destination, and the heroes each took a look at it until Legend finally spoke up.

“We’re in my time,” he said, “about forty miles away from the border of Holodrum. Kakariko should be a couple days’ travel that way.”

“All right then,” Time said, “let’s start traveling.”

And so they walked. They walked and walked for hours and hours. At lunch time, they sat at the side of the road and ate fruits and jerky. After lunch, they walked and walked. They met no travelers, they encountered no monsters, and they found nothing amiss or awry. They walked until the sky started to burn orange, and finally, they stepped off the road to set up camp. As everyone dropped their packs and began divvying up tasks and errands, Wild spoke up to the camp at large.

“I’m going out for a walk before I start dinner,” he said, pointing towards the nearby treeline. “I’ll be back within half an hour.”

“Would you like some company?” Twilight asked.

“No, thanks,” he replied with a small smile. “I won’t stray too far.”

With that, he disappeared into the woods, into the wild, into his domain. For a rare moment, the noise in his head simply faded away, and all he heard was the sound of leaves rustling in the wind. Of birdsong. Of small animals scurrying along branches. He paid enough attention to remember his way back, but he let his mind close itself away and followed a new path his feet lay of their own accord. He weaved through trees and over stumps until he found himself at the foot of a sheer rock wall. 

Wild looked it up and down with an uneasy frown on his face. It’d be an easy climb, under better circumstances, but the stone in his hip and the steel in his spine put a foul taste of trepidation in his spirit. He heard a voice in his head—one that couldn’t decide if it was Twilight’s, Time’s, or Warriors’s—admonishing him for even considering it. But what had been a chunk of steel in his spine, only a few days ago, was now only a knife’s blade. The stone was hot, but no longer scalding; the claws had retracted and left only one behind, and the pins had grown shorter.

In the end, his spirit won out.

Hand-hold to hand-hold, foot by foot, Wild made his way up the cliff with practiced ease. The wind tugged at his hair and cloak, but he paid it little heed. The shadow of a hawk passed over him, but he had no visitors. Just as he started to feel his breath getting heavier, his hand settled on the top ledge and pulled himself up. He sat atop the cliff, his feet dangling against the wall he’d just climbed, and just looked out at the view. 

Green. It was all just green for miles, and miles, and miles.

The foreign bodies Wild felt—the stone, the blade, the claw and pins—throbbed in time with his heartbeat, but he couldn’t help but smile at the sight. His eyes squinted against the light of the setting sun until they were drawn upwards by a little song. A large tree stood a few feet from the cliff’s edge, its branches stretching out over the drop, and on one of those branches sat a whistling thrush. Its head twitched about as it listened, until the distant echo of a response from somewhere below reached Wild’s ears. Then it sang another verse and waited. After a moment, another response arrived through distance and time, and the thrush launched from the branch, flying down to the forest below.

The champion watched it fly off with a smile on his face, and for the first time in a long while, everything felt okay.

A new sound reached Wild’s ears from somewhere behind him, one much lower in pitch than birdsong. It was brief, there one second and gone the next. He turned around and listened, his eyes scanning the sparse treeline behind him. The sound came again—a growl of some kind? A groan? It sounded quite familiar to Wild, but at the same time, somehow, so hard to place. Standing, he drew his bow and slowly crept into the treeline. He slowly rolled on the balls of his feet, minimizing the sounds of his footfalls. The third time he heard it, he knew exactly what it was.

A moan.

Wild pressed forward, past a large bush filled with berries of some kind, and found a downward slope into what he could only call a bowl of stone. At the bottom of this bowl were stones and rocks of various sizes. Underneath this pile of stones, buried from the chest down, was a Hylian man, his eyes closed and his skin an angry red, laced with blisters.

The champion’s eyes widened before he ran back to the cliff’s edge and drew a bomb arrow from his quiver. He nocked the arrow and aimed towards the sky as he drew the bowstring back.

_thwock_

The bomb arrow flew into the air, Wild’s eyes fixed on it as he nocked and drew back another bomb arrow. When the first began to fall towards the ground, he lined up his second shot and loosed the arrow.

_thwock_

**_BWOOM_ **

The two arrows collided, their ordnance barely detonated as he prepared the second signal.

_thwock_

  
  
  
  
  


_thwock_

**_BWOOM_ **

With help now—probably—on the way, Wild ran back to the stone bowl and slid down to the pile of stones below. He made his way over to the man and felt for a pulse. His own heart rate quickened when he found one—faint, but there. Wild’s eyes widened when the man’s head began to move, a hoarse voice muttering far too quietly to make out.

“Hello?” Wild said. “Hello, mister? Can you hear me? Nod if you can hear me.” The man’s voice grew a little stronger, but he made no effort to nod. His eyelids lifted enough to expose a sliver of white, but Wild couldn’t see the iris at all.

 _“Cook?!”_ a distant voice called from the direction of the cliff.

“Hold on, mister,” Wild said, “if you can hear me, I’ll be right back, I’m gonna help you, I promise!” He stood and bolted up the slope of the bowl and ran back to the cliff’s edge, looking over it to find Legend at the bottom. “Veteran!!” he called down.

Legend looked up and cupped his hands to his mouth. “What happened?!”

“I found someone! He’s buried under some rock, I need help to free him!”

“Step away from the tree! Gimme a clear shot!”

Wild complied and watched the veteran draw a device from his adventuring pouch and aim it towards the tree. The spear-tip blade of Legend’s hookshot sprung forth from the device and embedded into the bark of the tree trunk. The chain then reeled him up from the ground to the clifftop in mere seconds. Returning his hookshot to his pouch, Legend said, “Let’s go!”

The champion led the veteran back to the stone bowl, where he resumed the position he’d left beside the man’s head. “Hello! Mister!”

“Hold on,” Legend said as he pulled his titan’s mitts onto his hands, “let’s get these off of him, then we can get some potions and water down his throat.”

Legend set to work, lifting and throwing the outermost stones first—the ones with the smallest chance of shifting the weight pressing down on the man. A few minutes into the process, Twilight appeared at the edge of the bowl and slid down beside Wild. When the champion filled him in, he set to work moving what stones he could. After ten minutes of excavation, Wild was able to pull the man up onto his lap.

“Hey, mister,” he said, cradling the man’s neck with one arm and withdrawing a fairy tonic from his pouch with the other. “If you can hear me, I’m gonna give you something to drink. I need you to try and swallow it, okay?” He waited for a response, but only got unintelligible mumbling. With a frown, he uncorked the bottle with his teeth and tilted it toward the man’s lips. The man sputtered, some of the tonic spilling down his chin and cheeks, but he soon began swallowing under his own power. Wild pulled it away after a few gulps, saying, “Whoa, easy, you’ve gotta go slow, okay? Easy, easy.”

He repeated the process for the next several minutes, the sky growing darker and darker. “Is he safe to move?” Twilight asked. “We need to get him back to camp.”

“I think so,” Wild answered. “How’d you get up here?”

“There’s a footpath, nearby. I can piggyback him down.”

With that settled, Legend and Wild helped get the man onto Twilight’s back. The rancher lifted him up by the legs and led the way back to the other heroes, the last of the sun’s light fading away.

* * *

Time ended up making dinner that evening, so preoccupied with the unconscious man was Wild. He didn’t wake up that night, and the heroes spent the next day gathering branches and leaves and trying to construct a stretcher with the materials they had on hand. So complex and alien was the process that they could not complete it before sundown. Meanwhile, they took shifts sitting beside the found man, occasionally giving him water throughout the day. In the afternoon, they gave him a red potion Legend had brewed, but any effects it had were unseen.

That evening, Legend was on shift when the man from the rubble awoke.

He groaned, his eyes fluttering open and his brows furrowed in confusion. “Wh...Wh—”

“Whoa whoa whoa, easy, easy,” Legend said before calling over his shoulder, “he’s awake!”

Wild abandoned the stew he was stirring and darted over, kneeling down beside Legend, who was gently lifting the man’s head up. “Hey, hey, take it slow,” he said as he unscrewed his waterskin. “Drink this, it’s water.”

The man greedily drunk from the skin until it was pulled away, his mouth trying to follow it for a moment. After catching his breath, his eyes bounced back and forth between Legend, Wild and the other heroes in his line of sight. “Who— Who are you? Where am I?”

“It’s okay,” Legend said, ”you’re safe. My name is Link, this is my friend…um…my friend, uh—”

“Kass,” Wild supplied.

 _“Kass._ He found you trapped under some rocks a little ways away from our camp about a day ago. He came back to get us and a few of us dug you out. What’s your name?”

“M— Maki,” the man answered. “My name is…Maki.”

Legend nodded. “Okay, good. We’ve got potions and stuff to help you, but right now, we gotta get some water into you, okay?”

Hyrule appeared at Maki’s other side with a smile and said, “We’ll take care of him, Kass. Why don’t you go finish dinner?”

Wild blinked at the traveler, his eyes briefly flickering down to Maki, before he nodded. “Yeah. I’m on it.”

Sometime later, when dinner was served, Maki was able to remain seated upright when lifted. His serving was much smaller than the others—the last thing he needed was to upset his stomach by eating too greedily—but he was able to eat and keep his meal down. After Wild finished his meal, he stood and returned to sit beside Maki, wordlessly relieving Sky of watch duty.

“How are you doing?” he asked, immediately kicking himself for how _stupid_ such a question was. But Maki met it with a laugh.

 _“Better._ Unequivocally _better.”_ He lifted the waterskin that had been left for him to his lips and took another small pull, swishing the water in his mouth and clearly _savoring_ it. He gave a slow, dramatic swallow before opening his mouth with a loud lip-smack and a sigh.

Wild huffed and smiled at him. “Good. That’s good.”

“No, your _soup_ is good,” Maki replied with a grin. “I’m not sure if I’m just happy to be alive or if it truly _is_ some of the best stew I’ve ever had.”

The smile fell from Wild’s face. “What happened to you? Up there?”

The grin on Maki’s face pulled a similar disappearing act as he shook his head and let out a heavy sigh. “I was mining. I hear there’s some kinda metal in that cliff, really rare, really valuable. It’d buy my kids a pretty pony, figuratively _and_ literally. But I guess the shaft I was digging wasn’t as stable as I thought and…well, you know.”

Wild nodded, his eyes fixing on the blisters on Maki’s nose. “How long were you trapped?”

“Oh, I dunno. Days. I lost count after the fourth. I was able to weasel my waterskin out and make it last, thank Din, but eventually I ran out, and then everything just gets...kinda fuzzy.” Wild frowned, his eyes falling as he searched for something to say. Before he could find anything, Maki shook his head again. “But…there is _some_ stuff I remember crystal clear.”

“Like what?”

“Like….” Maki’s eyes squinted, his gaze fixed on something in the distance only he could see. “I saw myself. Like I was floating over my own body, watching me sleep. I was muttering something about Palleta…a girl I had quite a crush on when I was a young man. I saw animals in the forest. Wolves and bears, _meat_ -eaters, all roaming about. They weren’t close enough to smell me, but I could see that it was only a matter of time. And I saw….”

Maki’s eyes began to glisten, but he pressed on. “I saw my wife and my children. They were play-wrestling in the front yard, and she was cheering them both on from her rocking chair on the porch. She was needling a sweater that I’d never seen before, but—” He sniffled, the first tears trailing down his cheeks. “But I— I _knew_ she was making it for _me._ It was _just for me.”_ His face dropped into his hand, which covered his eyes like a domino mask while he sputtered and sobbed. Without thinking, Wild reached out and placed a hand on his shoulder, gently patting his upper arm. He felt the eyes of the other heroes on his back. But then, there was a change in the way Maki’s shoulders trembled. And his sobs became something else. They became…chuckles. He lifted his face, covered in blisters, tears, and snot, to reveal a grin.

“You know,” he said, stopping only to sniff, “it’s funny. I saw _all_ of these things, things I couldn’t have possibly seen…but….” His grin exploded into a full-blown smile. One hand held up his waterskin and the other motioned toward it, as if presenting a treasure, before he said, “But I never saw _this_ coming!”

His hands fell to his lap as he laughed and shook his head. He smiled for another second, and then he leaned forward—with a speed and strength Wild would never have expected—and wrapped his arms around the champion, pulling him into a massive hug. He wept and laughed into Wild’s shoulder and said, _“Thank you,_ Kass, _thank you so much._ You’ve given me my _family_ back, my— my— everything, you’ve given me….”

Wild didn’t know what was happening. Maybe it was the pressure of the hug or the words or the wet spot on his shoulder, but suddenly, an octo-balloon appeared in his chest and inflated with _horrifying_ speed until it instantly filled his entire chest and _popped._ A dam of some kind shattered like an ice wall and unleashed a _torrent_ of _something_ in his chest that he couldn’t hope to contain. Without thought, he threw his own arms around Maki and tried to squeeze him back _just_ as tightly, tears spilling down his cheeks as well. The other heroes looked away, giving them something akin to privacy while they simply held on and cried and reassured each other—and themselves—that they had both made it after all.

**THE END**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Today is a special day, for a couple of purely coincidental reasons.
> 
> First of all, today is the Linked Universe Discord server's 2nd birthday! That's important because numerous writers on that server are/were responsible for many of the stories that brought me back into regularly reading, and wanting to write, fanfiction. This story was helped by many writers there, through both constructive feedback and simple moral support. Special thanks in particular go out to St0rmy, Glau, Gladi, and Usagisama, and super-duper-special thanks also go to server-exclusive fan-artist extraordinaire Fidget the Crazy, who just yesterday posted a piece of artwork for this story that's _fucking amazing_. I've added it to the beginning of the first chapter as a cover image, check it out!
> 
> Second of all, today is the 185th Anniversary of the day the Alamo fell. Why the hell does _that_ matter? 'Cause the only Zelda fanfic I wrote in high school, before I retired, was a longfic that was essentially an adaptation of the the John Lee Hancock film _The Alamo_. Like I said, purely coincidental.
> 
> Thank you from the bottom of my heart for joining me on this ride.


End file.
